Operation: Red Crescent
by MercurialInK
Summary: A mossad agent blamed for the theft of top-secret information. An unknown terror stalking the streets of his hometown. Another mission - diving into deep cover in a terrorist cell in Gaza - to discover the truth. Has the luck of the devil run dry at last?
1. Prelude to Disaster

Operation: Red Crescent

**Hey guys, I've had this one brewing for a bit, so it shouldn't take very long to finish. I mean, it'll probably be long, but not rambling and trying to find its way in the dark like Where the Wild This are is. I know some of you are disappointed that I haven't updated in a while… I'll try my best to get something out within the next week. In the meantime, enjoy Operation: Red Crescent, taking place after Crocodile Tears.**

**I begin focusing on Agent Shalom. From the next chapter on, its all Alex's POV pretty much, but I wanted to set the stage without too much exposition. So you'll meet Alex next chapter.**

**As per usual, I do not own the rights to Alex Rider, even a little. This is purely an intellectual exercise for personal and public entertainment with no monetary transaction involved (happy, copyright lawyers? Sheez…).**

**Have fun!**

**...**

Kevin Davis, the head of the Central Intelligence Agency looked up when he heard a knock at his door. Like anyone who lived the life of an agent, he knew that when his colleagues cam to call at three in the morning, something big was going down.

Usually, it was something bad.

Tonight however, was a good night. Certainly, the events of the last 48 hours had left a bittersweet taste in his mouth, but that was how it worked when a trusted agent goes rouge. Cleaning up messes like this was part of being the head of any intelligence agency. He had been heading this search for the last two days, subsiding on energy drinks and sheer willpower, and he would be very happy when this dangerous agent was back in the custody of their home government.

"Come in," he called in response to the knock.

Two guys from the FBI escorted a young woman in. Neither of them looked happy to be there (hell, their director hadn't exactly been happy when Davis, newly assigned to the director position of the CIA, took control of the case and then used FBI research and manpower to bring the rogue agent in, but they would live with it).

Because Davis had won this round. He looked up at the woman, studying her, already analyzing every movement to try and get a read on her. She looked far to young to be the seasoned agent gone rouge that he had been ordered to hunt down and bring in. Davis glanced down at her open file in front of him. He didn't need to see it to know what it said - he'd long since memorized every detail in it's pages that hadn't been redacted. It said that she was twenty-three, but he doubted she was a day older than twenty. Her wrists were handcuffed behind her back, but as far as Davis was concerned, that hardly made her less of a threat.

"Agent Yedit Shalom, you are in a lot of trouble," he said finally, clearing his throat.

"Your information is wrong," Shalom said. Her voice was calm, completely and utterly calm. Not desperate, not angry. Did she have a contingency plan for escaping custody, or was she just not afraid of being caught? "I'm not here to run away from Mossad. I'm here to clear my name. I did not compromise any information. Not to any government or otherwise. I am loyal to my country, Director Davis."

"Your handlers say differently," Kevin Davis said, gesturing for the FBI men to unlock the agent's handcuffs so she could sit down. Both FBI guards could fire a non-lethal shot before Shalom got anywhere near one of the three of them, and given that there was a desk between them, Davis knew himself that his gun was close enough to grab and fire before she reached him. He wasn't threatened in the slightest.

Shalom, on the other hand, was thrown off guard, which was kind of the point. She sat after a second of hesitation, rubbing her wrists to ease the pain of their confinement.

"My handlers have been misinformed," she replied. "I was set up."

Davis opened the file on his desk, going through it for the sake of the agent in front of him.

"Pictures, bank statements, tapped phones… It looks pretty convincing, Agent Shalom," Davis said. "Who would go to the trouble of faking all this evidence, just to get rid of one Israeli agent? You have no shortage of trained operatives."

"Look, I do not exactly... what is the phrase you would use...? Play well with others?" Shalom said. "I've pissed a lot of people off, and I could paper a house with the list of them all. I can name five people off the top of my head that have the resources, motive, and access to pull this off and blame me for it."

"Your government has asked me to extradite you to Israel to be tried," Davis continued, largely ignoring her. The hint of desperation in her plea was a good act - but all the evidence he had in front of him told him that it was nothing more than an act. Even if he did feel some sympathy for Yedit Shalom, he could not, as the director of the CIA, take her words on faith alone. "You will loose, and you'll probably spend the rest of your life in jail, unless your agency decides your death would be simpler."

"Mossad is not Scorpia; we don't do assassinations," Agent Shalom replied. Davis mentally snorted; from the information he had, his analysts had gathered that Yedit Shalom was formerly assigned to Kidon, the unit in Mossad responsible for kidnappings and assassinations. What was interesting, however, was that she hadn't even flinched when Davis had implied that she might be killed by her own country. So she was either sure of escaping... or genuinely didn't fear death.

Though that was only partially correct: Shalom wasn't afraid of getting taken out by her colleagues. She was afraid of what they would do if they thought she was holding information that might save their country.

Davis could feel his third headache in twenty-four hours building behind his eyes, and fought the urge to rub at his forehead and show any weakness that this trained agent might exploit.

"You say 'we' like your agency still considers you to be one of them," Davis said coldly.

"Look, I just want to clear my name," Agent Shalom replied. "I have dedicated my life to the protection of Israel, and I will not go to jail for crimes that are not my own, or defect, do you understand? I just need some help to prove it. What was the information that led Mossad to condemn me? Where did it come from?"

Davis leaned forward over the desk.

"See the problem with you asking me for help is… I don't believe you," he said quietly. "I've seen agents in your position before, they try to lie their way out, and they'll say almost anything to get themselves off the hook. You may have been a good agent at one time Shalom, and you may have saved your country many times, but you're a traitor. You stole information that could potentially lead to mass destruction, and then sold it to the highest bidder."

Agent Shalom stood abruptly. The two FBI men took a step forward, ready in case she was going to fight.

"Well, I see it was wrong to let myself be taken in to ask for your help," she answered. "I'll just see my way out then."

She turned, kicking out one of the FBI guys' legs from beneath him as she did. He fell. Agent Shalom picked his gun out of his hand and aimed it at the other one.

"I'd stay where you are," she advised him. There was a hardness around her eyes that said that the agent had no problems pulling the trigger and ending the mans life. He put down the gun.

"You're just making it worse for yourself, in the end," Davis advised her.

"I am innocent!" Agent Shalom hissed. "And I will find a way to prove it."

With that, she bolted out of the office, knowing she only had a few seconds before the two FBI agents were after her again.

The agent barely looked up when the alarms started blaring. Her last hope had been the Americans. Even though they were allies with Israel, she had hoped that at the very least, the CIA would hear her out.

Seeing the file up front, however, had been at least a little helpful though. Whoever had set her up was a professional; she couldn't have done better herself, and she had been in the business for a long time. Unofficially, she had started when she was fifteen, though her papers officially stated she was eighteen at the time. It hadn't really been her choice, but she preferred this kind fieldwork to being in the military.

Agent Shalom heard steps coming down the hall behind her, and immediately dodged to the doorway on her rights – she got lucky; it was a service stairwell. She pounded down it as fast as she could.

What good would getting away do if there was nowhere she could hide to pull together her defense? Agent Shalom wondered. She might as well just give herself up to the reinforcements running down the stairwell after her. She needed to go somewhere she could regroup, and then find some of her old contacts, see what she could drum up. Maybe someone would know something. She didn't know what had been stolen, or by whom... but she did know that it was big. Huge. Whatever was going on here, Yedit needed data to crunch, information to process, to try and figure this out.

Agent Shalom almost ran headlong into someone at the bottom of the stairs. She was halfway up again when the man pulled a gun on her. She cursed one, in Hebrew, looking up the barrel of the gun. The man considered her for a second, and then held up an arm to get her to her feet.

"Got her," he said into a cell phone he pulled from his pocket as the FBI filled out on the stairs above and below them.

After a minute, the agents on the stairs above them parted for Kevin Davis, who was coming down from the top floor.

"It would have been much easier to just give yourself up," he told her. Agent Shalom shrugged, glaring at him.

"I would tell the Israelis to keep looking for leaks when you hand me over," she answered. She felt exhausted. She'd been running for... she didn't even remember. Her last chance had been hoping that the Americans would believe her, and now? Now she was well and truly screwed. "I'm not the one who betrayed my country."

She knew what happened next. She'd be carted away to some cell for an hour while Davis confirmed with the Israelis that she was captured, and Mossad would retract the international alert they had put out on her. The CIA would fly her into Israel, and Mossad would attempt to discovered exactly how big the leak they had was from her, before throwing her in prison for the rest of her life. Procedure.

_Meanwhile, our enemies are laughing at us, _she thought uneasily. There was a leak, no question. Setting her up had to have been an inside job. But to what end?

The agent she had nearly tripped over handed her a pair of handcuffs.

"Put those on, behind your back, and come quietly," he said. Agent Shalom looked around at the FBI, the CIA agents that had managed to catch up and the guns they were carrying. She scanned the stairway, but there was just no way to get out of this, unless…

She glanced casually over the rail. The stairs continued down, and there were no agents on the level below her.

She winked at Davis, and launched herself over the railing. She slammed into the stairs one story down, and pulled herself up, ignoring her aching shoulder. She had to run. She could already hear shouting and the pounding of feet. A gun went off, striking the wall in front of her.

_Crazy bastard! _Agent Shalom thought. There was no worse place (aside from airplanes) to shoot a gun than a crowded stairwell. Obviously, one of the American agents was a newbie, and running scared. That wasn't good.

Knowing there would be agents coming up the stairs in a matter of seconds, agent Shalom pushed open the door to the third floor, slamming it behind her. She had almost made it to the end of the hallway when she heard the click of a gun.

"Don't move!" A voice yelled. For the second time in about five minutes, Agent Shalom turned to find herself staring down the barrel of a gun. Damn it! He was reasonably tall, dark haired, wearing a black suit.

Field agents have a way of standing, of walking, just a manner about them that warns anyone nearby that they are capable of killing a man with two fingers. It's something around the eyes, and the hard lines that draw their face that tips you off that this isn't a person you want to mess with.

The man picked up his cell phone and dialed again.

"She's out on the street, she used the fire escape from the second floor, heading east," he said, and clicked the phone shut.

What?

"What do you want?" Agent Shalom asked, edging a few steps away from the other agent. At least he wasn't directly interested in killing her or capturing her, which was good. Possibly.

"My name is Ben Daniels. I am a field operative employed by MI6," the man answered. "I've been assigned by my agency to track down the leak in Israel's security. We don't like the idea that someone is talking with Hammas, Fatah, Iran and Jordan, all at the same time, all about some big secret piece of information that we think is rather dangerous. We have a vested interest in the area, and we would like to clear this mess up."

"By killing me," Agent Shalom spat.

"No," Agent Daniels said, putting down his gun. "We want to talk. You say you aren't the leak, Director Blunt is willing to hear you out. My job is to bring you to MI6."

"You are aware that circumventing Israel's alert in defiance of the ICC is kind of against most of the international agreements you're a signatory to, right?" Yedit asked. Daniel's just raised his eyebrows. Yedit sighed.

"Okay, so what's the escape plan?"

"The only way I'll get you out of the country is to pose you as some low level criminal that's escaped justice in England by flying over the pond," Daniels told her. "I can get you out of here within the next hour or so – or you can take the chance that the Israelis will be nice about protecting their intelligence."

"Extradition papers take days to process, weeks sometimes," Agent Shalom said, wondering exactly why Daniels had come up with a plan like this when it needed so much legwork.

"We filed them three days ago, they were approved this morning," Daniels replied. "We figured you would come to the Americans if the Israelis gave up on you."

Agent Shalom studied Daniels for another moment. On the one hand, she'd already proven that nobody trusted her or was willing to even entertain the idea that she might not be a traitor. On the other hand, there was really no way she was going to get out of this alive. She had no weapons, no tactical support, nothing. If MI6 believed that she was telling the truth… she might get out of this, and she might even get her job back. If they didn't... well, Yedit was running out of options very quickly.

"Fine," she said. "I'll talk with your director."

"Wonderful," the british agent said. He reached into the backpack he was carrying, and pulled out a smaller bag, handing it to Agent Shalom. "You need to look a little less like you if I'm going to be sneaking you out of here as someone else," he told her when she peeked inside. She nodded, and looked around for a bathroom. There was one at the end of the hall opposite to the stairs, which was good – she would have plenty of warning if anyone came by.

Five minutes later, she left the restroom. Her red hair had been dyed black, and she had applied dark makeup around her eyes. Using some of the chemicals in the bag, she had ruined her clothes beyond recognition, and had cut the sleeves off her tee. She sliced a few holes in her jeans too, for good measure. Her lips had been made several shades darker with some crimson lipstick. Her arms looked bruised and dirty, and she had cut a good foot of her newly darkened hair, which had previously hung in a braid down to her waist. It was now hanging around her shoulders, tied back with a kerchief. She had left what she had used up in the trash under a few layers of used hand towels.

"Nice," Agent Daniels said when Agent Shalom tossed the bag back to him in the hall. He caught it, and tossed the handcuffs back to her win the same movement. Agent Shalom grit her teeth and cuffed her hands in front of her, looking up at Daniels when she had managed it.

"I was going for sort of a crossover between druggie and gang member," she replied, offhand.

"You did fine," Daniel's said. "The CIA doesn't have any pictures of you in their database. Tragically, they must have gotten lost along the way."

Daniels was smiling, and Yedit returned it. The thrill of a hunt was already baying in her blood, pushing her back into the job.

"Your name is Sylvia Rameirez; a Costa Rican national, but you officially renounced your citizenship three years ago to carry a passport with the Union Jack," Agent Daniles told her cheerfully as he led her back towards the stairs. They passed a team of four FBI guys running down, but they gave the two little more than a passing glance. "Your associates were arrested while you were planning an arms smuggling operation," he whispered into her ear as they passed another group of federal agents.

"Arms smuggling?" Agent Shalom asked as they reached the garage.

"Fastest way to get someone extradited is if the feds think they're dealing," Agent Daniels said, pushing open the door. There was another team of agents by the door.

"Name?" they asked.

"Agent Daniels, from MI6," Agent Daniels pulled out his ID with one hand, keeping the other firmly around Agent Shalom's arm. "Here to pick up an arms dealer for extradition. Her name's Sylvia Rameirez."

"Check that," one of the agents said. There were a few tense seconds when the agent at the computer scanned his database, and then he turned back to Shalom and Daniels.

"You're cleared," he said. Daniels nodded, and half pulled Agent Shalom over to a dark government car.

"Get in, in front where I can see you," Daniels said. His back was to the other agents, and he winked once at Agent Shalom. She saw what he meant immediately. He wanted to make these guards remember that Daniels had left with his arms dealer. It meant less trouble for Daniels if the CIA started wondering how Agent Shalom disappeared, and allowed Agent Shalom to assert her cover.

She turned and lashed out with her foot. Daniels went down, but was back in his feet in instants. Agent Shalom slammed the open door into his face.

"You killed my brother you bastard!" She yelled, kicking him in the stomach once – not as hard as she could have, but hard enough to be convincing with it. The agents were running towards the two of them, pulling their guns.

But Daniels was already on his feet. In moments, he had Agent Shalom pinned to the hood of the car.

"Your brother was dealing in arms, like you were," Daniels said without pity. He tossed Agent Shalom into the front seat, unlocking her left handcuff so he could pin the right cuff to the door. He flicked the safety on before slamming it.

"Thanks for the help guys," he told the agents who had just reached him, wiping blood from his nose. "Effective security. Bloody Americans," Daniels added the last under his breath.  
"You handled it fine," the head of them told Daniels. "Better you than us taking this one in, anyway," another one added with a bit of a grin.

"Bugger off," Daniels said, glaring at the four agents. They returned to their post as Daniels started up the car.

"That was fun," Agent Shalom muttered as they reached the exit. Daniels pulled out his identification and Sylvia Rameirez was checked through the system for a second time, and then they were out on the street.

"By the way, how exactly, do you propose getting me on an airplane? My passport got taken, and even if I had it, it'd be useless for getting me anywhere."

"How did you get from Israel to America then?" Daniels asked.

"I don't have personal conversations when I'm in handcuffs, as a rule," Shalom answered. Daniels shrugged.

"Well, they're staying on until we reach MI6, so its going to be a pretty quiet ride if you don't want to say anything," Davis replied.

"Like I said, I'm not generally talkative when I'm in handcuffs," Agent Shalom answered.

There was a small, four seater plane waiting for them at the airport. Daniels didn't even bring them through security, but loaded Agent Shalom back onto it, handcuffing her hands back together.

"Hey Fox," the pilot called when they approached.

"Eagle," Daniels nodded. "Hope the wait wasn't too boring?" Eagle shook his head and started the engines up.

Agent Shalom sat back for the ride, closing her eyes; she didn't know what she was walking into, but she knew she would want to be well rested when she got there.

_I really hope that this isn't a mistake, _she thought to herself as the plane coasted down the runway, lifting into the sky as it headed towards the ocean.

...

**Edit: Chapter updated as of May 15, 2012**


	2. Another Mission

Operation: Red Crescent

Alex opened his eyes and groaned. His head hurt, somewhere in the back of his skull. His whole body hurt.

Slowly, he became aware of himself again. He tried to move, but he found his hands were tied down to the armrests of a chair. The room he was in was dark enough that he couldn't see anything except the outline of his body beneath him.

He was definitely in trouble.

"Hello Alex," a voice said, coming out of the darkness. A light flicked on above his head, and Alex blinked from the sudden intrusion of light.

"Who are you?" Alex asked.

"That's not important," the man said, stepping forward. He was wearing a dark suit, and he had blonde hair that combed back against his head. "What is important is that I have some questions for you. And I need some answers, or things could get a little… unpleasant for you."

Alex mentally shuddered, but he visibly rolled his eyes, because seriously? That line was so overused it was actually kind of funny.

If you know, you got over the fact that it was usually followed by excruciating and unbearable torture.

_Deny everything, confirm nothing. You don't know anything; play to your age.. But if that doesn't work, and you have to give up information, make sure it's either useless or wrong. And as soon as possible, get out, _Alex thought to himself. That was what Mrs. Jones had told him about ending up in situations like this.

He looked around the room, now illuminated by sharp bright light, looking for weak points. There were no doors facing him, but he couldn't turn his head very far.

"What the heck is this?" Alex demanded. He didn't need any incentive to play the terrified teen. His voice came out a little higher than it might normally, even though he was fighting for control. "What's going on?"

"Alex, Alex, Alex, I already know all about you, so let's skip the part where you play coy," the man said.

"I don't know what you're talking about, but I have to get back home. I have schoolwork to finish – just leave me alone, please!"

The man didn't even look fazed.

"Shall I help you fill in the blanks then, to spare some time?" The man asked.

"Your name is Alex Rider. You've been working for MI6 since your uncle died almost a year ago. You've worked covert operations all around the world and above it since then, most recently in Kenya."

_He knows. _Alex felt a jolt of fear stab him right in the heart. If they knew who he was, he had no chance.

_Deny everything._

"I don't know what the hell you're talking about! I'm fifteen, I go to school in the city," he yelled desperately. "Please, just-"

"What I would _like _to know," the man continued, ignoring Alex's protests entirely "is what kind of surveillance MI6 has on my operation. And you will tell me very shortly, because you will do anything to stop the pain."

The next thing Alex felt was pain burning his face as the man punched him. He tasted blood in his mouth, and he spat red.

"I don't know anything," he said. The mans' fist came in contact with his face yet again. This time, Alex heard a dull ringing in his ears.

Suddenly, all the lights in the room were turned on. Alex blinked as spots exploded in his eyes. There was the sound of a door opening and closing.

"What the hell?" Alex heard his captor ask.

"Sorry, training session's been cut short – something's come up," another voice said. The restraints were cut off his wrists and ankles, and Alex stood, stretching painfully and rubbing circulation back into his wrists.

"Hey Cub," he heard the second voice say. "How'd your first brush with being trained to withstand interrogation go?"

Recognizing Eagles' voice, Alex's heart spiked with fear, before a violent rage gripped him. MI6 was behind this? Honestly, Alex wasn't sure he was surprised.

It had been his own idea. Kind of. After being tortured over a pit of alligators by a psycho who seriously needed more hugs as a kid, Alex and Mrs. Jones had talked about torture and interrogation. Mrs. Jones had told him that it was considered standard to put operatives through training to withstand interrogation before they were ever sent out into the field. Alex had made the mistake of agreeing that it was a good idea, judging from his own experiences.

On the other hand, he had been done with MI6. Mrs. Jones had just been checking up on him, not speaking to him as an operative. He was done. He had been for nearly two years. MI6 was in his past, and Alex didn't appreciate getting dragged off the streets and pushed back into working for them.

"Might want to clean yourself up first," Eagle said, handing Alex a towel when they reached the hall. Looking around, Alex realized he had been in the Royal and General, probably the basement. The carpeting and color scheme matched too perfectly with that of the bank to be anywhere else.

Alex wiped at the blood that was starting to drip down the side of his face.

"What's going on?" he asked.

"I know about as much as you," Eagle said. "I flew Fox and this crazy chick from Mossad in from the states, and just as I was leaving, they told me to go find you."

"Fantastic," Alex muttered.

"So, Cub," Eagle said. "Mind explaining why I find you in the basement of MI6 for a training exercise in resisting torture?"

"Blame Blunt," Alex said defensively. "It was probably his idea."

"And how long have you known Blunt?"

"Long enough," Alex muttered under his breath. They had reached the elevator. Eagle pressed the button.

"So you don't know anything about crazy chicks from Mossad?" Eagle asked with a wide, teasing smile. Alex shook his head as they stepped inside.

They rode up in the elevator silently. Stepping out again, Alex was struck by the similarity between this floor, one with offices and files, and the one downstairs, which was clearly not used for offices and files.

Wondering if Eagles 'crazy chick' was the reason he had been dragged back into MI6, Alex followed the SAS man down the hall and into Alan Blunts office.

Blunt was seated as his desk, a file open in front of him. There was a woman with bright red hair leaning against the bookcase to his right. She was dressed plainly, but Alex caught the outline of a gun at her side when she turned to look at the door. He guessed that this was the crazy chick. Fox was leaning against the bookcase next to her, looking relaxed but wary.

"Hello Alex," Blunt said.

Alex wondered what would happen if he punched the head of MI6, just in revenge for the black eye he was going to have. He decided against it, if only because he knew both Eagle and Fox could bring him down before he made it.

"I thought I was done," Alex said very quietly. "You made it clear that was the case."

"And I thought you were actually going to help me," the woman leaning against the bookcase said.

"Considering you haven't been sent back to the Israelis, against my better judgment, Agent Shalom, I have helped you a great deal already," Blunt said to the woman. He turned to Alex.

"We had no intention on calling on you ever again when we parted at the end of your last mission Alex," he said. "The Prime Minister was rather put out with your work, if you remember."

"Yet here I am," Alex said bitterly. He had a flash of memory from the day before, putting out the garbage and getting jumped from behind and falling painfully into the sidewalk. "Thanks for yesterday, by the way," he added. Blunt didn't even blink.

"We would have left you alone Alex, but we received this two days ago," Blunt said, holding out a sheet of paper on his desk. "Someone knows who you are and intends on using you to break into the agency. It was my suggestion that you undergo training so that I could nullify the threat to my agency, and give you the skills to need to defend yourself. That was an exercise in urban escape and imprisonment, part of which is keeping it together long enough to find an escape route."

Alex rolled his eyes, but this time, he didn't have an argument. _At least it only had been MI6_, he told himself bracingly. _Better the enemy you know, and all that_.

He took the paper and read it. It was a very short missive.

_A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. An agency is only as secretive as its weakest agent is. I wonder how well you protect the teenagers you employ._

Looking up, Alex raised an eyebrow.

"This is why I'm standing in front of you right now, instead of enjoying my summer break like every 15 year old in the world right now?" he asked incredulously. This was stupid.

"This, delivered to our front step pinned to the head of one of our best operatives is why we felt the need to ensure the agencies security," Blunt corrected him. "And that includes the security of our assets. As it stands, you can either go back home and place yourself and your housekeeper at risk from whoever sent this to us, or you can help a fellow agent in need."

Alex didn't take very long to mull it over. Blunt seemed seriously thrown by the threat that had been left on the doorstep of MI6 with the dead body of an agent, which meant the threat was viable enough to be a risk to himself and Jack. Alex didn't want to work for MI6, but if the alternative was getting what he had gotten as a dry run downstairs for real, he'd choose MI6. He hated them for sticking him in this situation, where he was put in danger while working for them, and then had to work for them again because he was in danger. It sucked.

"Fine," he snapped.

"Wonderful," Blunt replied. "Alex, this is agent Yedit Shalom, one of Mossads youngest and most experienced operatives," Blunt gestured to the woman leaning against the bookcase. "Agent Shalom, this is Agent Rider, _our _youngest and most experienced operative."

"Pleasure," Agent Shalom said, not moving. She seemed to be taking his measure.

"Agent Shalom has been accused of selling some rather dark secrets from the Israelis to certain government and non-governmental interests that would like to see Israel destroyed," Alan Blunt said. Agent Shalom snorted.

"Regardless of what Iran or Jordan thinks of Israel, we have a vested interest in the security of the region – I don't think Fattah or Hammas will continue to ship oil on the Mediterranean for us if they win all the coastal cities in Israel. And of course, Israel has a much more stable government than there is in the Palestinian Authority. Which means we need to find the real leak in Mossads securiy. Part of that means clearing Agent Shaloms name."

"And we do that… how, exactly?"

"Yes, I'm rather interested in this part myself," Agent Shalom added.

"Well, my plan was to send in a two person team, Agent Daniels and Agent Rider, and-"

"There is no way I am not going to be there to clear my own name," Agent Shalom interjected.

"So you'd prefer to get captured by the Israelis while you were in Jordan?" Blunt asked. "That would help your case, I'm sure. Besides, I'm not quite sure I'm ready to let you out my sight, even if you are telling the truth."

"I speak Arabic and Urdu. I have non-governmental contacts in the regions. I have feelers in illegal organizations that know which way information is being sold. Can either of your agents attest to any of those?"

"I speak two dialects and Hebrew," Fox said, sounding a little insulted.

"Five, and I speak all of them, and Hebrew, with a native accent," Agent Shalom replied. Fox seemed to wilt a little under the sharpness of Agent Shaloms tone.

"I know the territory. With a good cover, the Israelis would never find me. I know all their best tricks," Agent Shalom continued. Blunt was looking from Shalom to Fox, and seemed to finally make a decision.

"Agent Daniels, Agent Shalom has made an excellent point," Blunt said. "Do you feel that she might be better equipped to handle this mission?"

"I think Agent Shalom is better equipped, but I also think the mission is made exponentially more dangerous if she comes," Fox said, choosing his words carefully. "What if an old contact recognized her and decided that selling her to the Israelis was better pay than helping her? What if whoever set her up comes after her? This whole mission could go to hell if she is compromised."

"You make several excellent points," Blunt said after the longest of silences. "Agent Shalom, I am putting you on this mission, but Agent Daniels will be your backup. He will be stationed in Cairo, and he will monitor you as frequently as he feels is necessary, and will have authority to step in if he feels the situation has become too dangerous."

"Then he can get set up with his base camp before we arrive, because that is where we need to begin our search," Agent Shalom said. "I have a contact there who may be able to tell me more about what information was leaked, and who leaked it."

"I will make the necessary arrangements," Blunt told all three of them. "Daniels, we'll have you on the soonest flight out of Heathrow as we can. Talk to Smithers and log out whatever equipment you feel you might need. Shalom, Rider, come back later this afternoon, and Mrs. Jones and I should have your cover identifications, and Smithers should have some gadgets for you both then as well," Blunt put in. Alex turned to leave.

"And please, Alex, watch yourself. You have an enemy nearby. Make sure you have one eye on your back at all times," Blunt called as he left.

...

**Edit: Updated as of May 15. Just cleaned up a bunch of minor grammar stuff that people had been complaining about. **


	3. Victory Eternal

Operation: Red Crescent – Victory Eternal

**Sorry for not updating for so long – I've been busy as hell getting caught up, and my fic's fell by the wayside. And unfortunately, this isn't an action heavy chapter, and its very short, so you're bound to be disappointed. My break starts very soon though, so I hope by this time next week I'll have updated at least once more.**

**Let me just give Talionyzero a gigantic e-hug for her fantastic review. I want to see more of you guys in the comments, okay? I love and value all of your guy's input, and I want to keep improving as a writer, and I want to know what you, as readers, are looking for. So don't be afraid to click the review button to let me know what you hated, what you loved, and what you'd like to see on the horizon!**

**As usual, no copyright infringement intended, I'm not the original author, etc.**

******...**

"These are your cover ID's," Alan Blunt said, passing the two passports to the agents sitting on the other side of his desk.

"You have got to be kidding," agent Shalom said angrily, snapping her passport closed after just a glance. "No way."

"So you prefer to interact with the enemies of Israel with the last name Shalom?" Alan Blunt said almost tonelessly enough for the question to seem harmless. Almost.

"There are literally billions of Arab names that you could have made up," Agent Shalom replied, tossing hers onto Blunt's desk.

"And, as you know, when you have to get passports quickly, it's much easier to work with already existing information rather than to just fabricate everything. It takes far too much time, which is the one thing that we do not have," Blunt countered.

"How did you even get this?" Agent Shalom demanded, tossing the passport onto the desk. "The Israelis will for sure have a notice out on this passport if they find it missing."

"That is neither here nor there," Blunt replied. "As for the passport, we have replicated it to the exact detail, and the name Zahrah Khalid has not been accompanied by alarm bells at customs for over five years, so you needn't worry. The file on those operations was declassified to Israel's western allies about a month after it ended, and I doubt your director will search for you under this name."

Agent Shalom looked like she wanted to say something nasty. Actually, so did Blunt, Alex though. Behind the stony expression, he was actually looking rather vexed at the Israeli agent, as if he could glare the entire problem into non-existance.

_What the hell are they on about? _Alex wondered. Clearly, Blunt had done some digging into Shaloms background and found something worth holding over her head. Information that would be useful for Alex, given that they were going undercover with names that Yedit obviously recognized, visiting old contacts that were probably also familiar with these names.

Not that Blunt was ever forthcoming with information, but Alex sometimes wondered if his director was deliberately trying to get him killed.

"What's the problem?" he asked, folding his arms and looking from the agent to Blunt, still locked in their epic battle of wills.

"Alex, you and Agent Shalom are approaching her old contacts underground in Egypt," Blunt explained, switching his gaze from the Israeli to Alex. "It's a militant group of Fatah operatives that were trained in Chechnya and work closely with Hammas. You and Shalom will get in, posing as new recruits, so that Shalom can get to the higher-ups she needs to talk to in order to get her information. Agent Shalom has some cursory issues with the identities chosen for you, but I have faith in your abilities to quietly resolve any issues that may arise from their use."

Alex looked over at Shalom in surprise when he heard the name Fatah. She didn't seem to be at all startled by the idea of spending time with killers, which officially made Alex the only one in the room who still thought that this was a bad idea.

"So we find a group of terrorists and try and get chummy," Alex said. "Sounds like a brilliant idea."

"Agent Daniels is acting as backup in case you run into any trouble," Blunt reminded him.

"One guy with a gun really tips the balance against a couple score guys with improvised explosives and AK-47's," Alex snarked back. Yedit snorted, but when she looked at him again (pretty much the first time she had addressed him since they had returned to Blunt's office to receive their final briefing), she was smiling a little.

"Alex, the smaller the number of people, the better," Agent Shalom said bracingly. "Siblings run away to join the cause of Palestinian nationalism together all the time, so the two of us together wouldn't look suspicious."

"Despite the fact that I don't look Arabic, and I don't speak the language," Alex said. Agent Shalom's eyebrows knit together, and she glanced over at Blunt.

"He makes a good point," she noted. "I know you have some great specialists with disguises, and he might be able to pass as middle eastern, but you're never going to get him to speak Arabic convincingly."

"You will handle it the same way you did for the operation in Thailand," Blunt said. To a confused Agent Shalom, Blunt explained his plan. "Alex will play the role of the shy little brother you dragged along because you couldn't leave him at home. Or say he was tortured and his vocal cords cut. It shouldn't be a problem."

"Right," Agent Shalom conceded. "I can make that work."

Alex flipped open the passport he was holding.

"Muntasir Khalid," he read the name out loud.

Agent Shalom made an indignant sound next to him, but when Alex looked up, she was glaring at Blunt again. Blunt ignored her.

"The two of you will be boarding a flight to Cairo this evening. After making contact with your Fatah cell, you should contact us with any information you get. Shalom, you know the drill – disposable phones, one time usage, then thrown out, and contact us immediately if you feel your cover has been blown, so we can get you out."

Alex could almost see the tension filling the air around Agent Shalom.

"Shalom, you _will _call off this mission if it becomes compromised," Blunt said.

"I will not be branded a traitor by my own country," Agent Shalom replied.

"Officially, you have no country anymore, Shalom, or do I need remind you of that once again? Your best hope is with MI6 and you know it. You work for us on this one, and if I say you will pull terminate this mission if it becomes a risk to either you or Agent Rider, then you will do so. If I do not have your complete assurance that this is the case, I can call your ex-director and have you shipped back to Israel by tomorrow morning."

Agent Shalom flinched at the last line, and looked away.

"I will not have you risking this mission to fulfill your plans of personal revenge."

"Fine," Shalom snapped. Alex heard her curse under her breath – it sounded semitic and kind of awesome, and Alex wondered if he could convince Agent Shalom to teach him how to curse in Arabic.

Blunt looked like he wanted to say something more on the subject, but he stopped himself. Instead he looked at Alex.

"This is a little out of your comfort zone Alex, but its better for you in the long run, both as a learning experience and a chance to keep you safe until we have a clearer understanding of what's going on over here. I don't like operating blind, but we really can't afford chaos to break free in the Middle East."

Alex looked down, not wanting to meet Blunt's eyes. He knew that the sympathy wasn't real, and he didn't want it to make him feel better. Somehow he preferred the fear, which was at least real and well grounded. The exchanges between Blunt and Shalom told him that there was clearly something else going on here, and neither of them seemed eager to let him in on secrets that might be responsible for his death in the field. He felt like he was being manipulated, and he didn't like that feeling. He'd certainly had enough of the experience working for MI6.

"Your flight leaves at eight o'clock," Blunt added, sliding two boarding passes over the desk. Alex slid his into the pages of his passport. "Which gives you roughly... two hours, before you need to be at the airport."

At the same time, there was a quiet knock on the door. Blunt called for the person to enter.

"Ah, Abby, just on time!" he called. To Shalom and Alex, he said. "This is our disguise expert, Abbigail."

Several hours later, Alex was sitting next to Agent Shalom on a plane to Cairo airport. She had the window seat, but had agreed to trade with him.

"The view isn't all that impressive the tenth or eleventh time," she said in a heavily Arabic accent.

They didn't talk for the whole flight, except for once, about an hour after taking off. Alex had opened his passport and was trying to properly sound out his new name.

Agent Shalom had laughed humorlessly from next to him. Alex started; he had thought she was asleep – she was leaning back in her seat perfectly still. Without opening her eyes, she said "I'm sorry, its not your accent, really. I was laughing because I was thinking how much we could use Muntasir Khalid at the moment."

When Alex said nothing in reply, Shalom opened her eyes and glanced at him.

"Your name means 'victory eternal,' in Arabic tradition," she said. "Although perhaps 'victory of god' might be a little closer to the intention."

They went back to their silence.

_Victory eternal indeed, _Alex thought. _I certainly hope so._

_ ..._

**Edit: Updated as of June 8th. Minor spelling and grammar reboot. **

**Also: A note about names in this series: Yedit Shalom gets her name from two sources. The first, Yedit, is the female version of Yehudah, both of which are names that derive from the plural 'yehudim' which is the hebrew name of the Jewish people. The Yedit that Miss Shalom is named after was a spitfire freshie on one of my debate trips who happened to be the only non-senior on the security council, and trust me when I say it didn't show.**

**Shalom is the hebrew word for peace, although it is used in greetings and farewells as well. It is actually a very common last name, especially among immigrants that have made 'aliyah' - or moved to Israel from the diaspora. Many Jewish families changed their names in the 40s, most fleeing the holocaust and leaving behind as much as they could of their lives in Eastern Europe, or trying to make a new start for themselves as they left areas of the middle east. **

******In essence, Yedit's name means 'peaceful Jew,' or more accurately, 'peaceful follower of god.' This is a delicious piece of irony because, as one of my reviewers pointed out, Yedit is the peaceful Jew that is at times neither peaceful nor Jewish, as the circumstance suits. ;D**


	4. Lessons

Operation: Red Crescent – Lessons

**Okay, here we go with chapter four of Operation: Red Crescent!**

**Sorry I've stagnated on this fiction, but I've been pretty busy, and I haven't been feeling the muse for this story. Today, however, I've decided pretty much how it will work out, so this is becoming a much clearer and easier process since I'm not hacking it out in the wilds of lost plot bunny land, which I often have to do. ****So I now have a good idea where this is going, and I have some excellent surprises in store. Keep reading, and enjoy! **

**As per usual, I own nothing, this is just for my own entertainment. Well, and yours, too, XD**

**...**

Alex stepped out of the Cairo International Airport. It was two in the morning, and he was bleary-eyed and exhausted from the six-hour flight. Agent Shalom had explained that they would be staying at a motel for the evening, and meeting up with her contacts in the morning.

He glanced around the near empty cab stand, looking for Fox. The agent was nowhere to be seen, though Alex knew that he was somewhere nearby, disguised, keeping an eye on him and Yedit.

Agent Shalom walked over and spoke in rapid Arabic with one of the cab drivers, and got in the back with her pack. Alex followed her lead and slid in next to her.

The motel they stayed in was small, discreet and clean. Agent Shalom swept the room for bugs before unwinding the scarf she had used to cover her head since they had left MI6 headquarters. Alex remembered that she had called it a hijab.

"That is the one thing I like about western fashion," she said. "Its not so hot. Try wearing a burqa in Pakistan in the summer. _Not fun."  
_

She pulled open one of the drawers and removed a pistol.

"Do those come standard in motel rooms in Egypt?" Alex asked, seeing the weapon and raising his eyebrow.

"Only when you know who to ask," Agent Shalom said. She weighed it in her hand and set it on the bed. She pulled up one end of the mattress on the other bed, and removed an AK-47.

"When did you set this up?" Alex demanded. "Does MI6 know about this?"

"When I was in the ladies room," Agent Shalom answered. "And this is what having contacts in a hostile region means, Alex. It means I don't worry about not having guns when I know there are three or four hotels within reach that always reserve one special room for people they know."

Alex frowned. Somehow, he didn't like the idea of someone knowing who they were already.

"Relax, newbie," Agent Shalom teased. "They told me you weren't going to... ah, freak out on me."

"I'm not," Alex answered, offended.

"Good," Agent Shalom answered. "Can you shoot one of these?" she asked, holding one of the AK's out for him. Alex shook his head. Agent Shalom regarded him critically for a second, and put it down next to her pistol.

"You better be worth it," was all she said. She started pulling apart the pistol, examining every bit. "Just a tip," she said when she caught Alex staring. "Never assume that your contacts won't pass on a jammed or broken gun. Everyone has a price Alex, remember that."

"I thought we were here proving that you don't have a price," Alex said flatly.

"No, we're proving the Iranians couldn't afford to buy me off," Agent Shalom replied, amused.

Alex lay back on the bed (the mattress now restored to its original position). He didn't remember falling asleep, but the next thing he knew, Agent Shalom, already fully dressed, was shaking him awake.

"What time is it?" Alex asked.

"Six-thirty," Agent Shalom answered. Alex let an exasperated sigh escape his lips before pulling himself out of bed. They had only slept for four and a half hours.

Alex gathered a change of clothes from his bag, and went to the bathroom to change and brush his teeth.

His new reflection started back at him while he completed these tasks. His hair and skin were several shades darker than he was used to, and it was a little disconcerting.

"I spoke with my contact in Cairo this morning," Agent Shalom said when he came out of the bathroom. "He heard about this business with the Iranians through a client, and he thinks he may know where I can find some answers."

"This is starting to sound like a wild goose chase," Alex said.

"Not so," Agent Shalom said. "My contact informed me that the information was stolen off a high security computer in Mossad; my handler's computer. That tells me that whoever stole the information was looking for something very specific. Something my handler knew about."

"So was there anything your handler was involved in that was worth all the effort of stealing it?" Alex asked.

"Aside from huge databases on Mossad operative and generally classified intelligence, I wouldn't know," Agent Shalom answered, slightly put out. "But my handler was specifically targeted. That means that there _was _something."

"Or maybe someone just wanted to screw Mossad's agents over, and you got especially unlucky?" Alex suggested. Shalom shook her head.

"This wasn't random," she objected. "I am sure there were agents much easier to set up than me, and yet I am the one who was picked. I want to know why that was, but then, thats just one more question added to the list of things I need to beat out of whoever was responsible for this."

"So where do we go from here?" Alex asked, deciding to ignore the other agent's obvious pleasure at the idea of being able to torture whoever had framed her.

"Honestly, I was surprised my contact knew as much as he did," Agent Shalom admitted. "The goal here is to find out which cell organized this theft. No one who knows anything is likely to share with an outsider, which means getting our hands dirty to get into the inner circle of a cell."

"Again, getting chummy with a bunch of terrorists sounds like a brilliant idea," Alex objected dryly.

"Alex, I was placed on an _international terrorist watch list _for being implicated even a little in this mess!" Agent Shalom said sharply. "Whatever went missing, it's worse than top secret. This is like someone stealing the launch codes for America's nuclear missiles. It could destabilize the entire Middle East. The rest of the world would line up against one another to back up their allies. It would be world war three."

Alex had a sudden mental image of Damian Cray, pushing a button on Air Force One, starting the countdown that would fire the most dangerous weapons ever created. He shivered in the warm morning air of Cairo.

"Point taken," he said. "So what did your contact tell you?"

"Blunt mentioned that my contacts in Fatah had connections to Hammas," Shalom began.

"There's a promising Hammas cell in Gaza that's recruiting," she said, smiling as if this was actually good news. "They're being very secretive about their organizational structure, but all their work has the signature of an old… acquaintance of mine." Alex gulped. All he knew about Gaza was that it had been forcibly evacuated a few years ago – videos of settlers in the region being dragged from their homes by IDF soldiers had been all over the news for a whole summer. It wasn't number one on his vacation list.

"How will we know where to find this cell?" he asked, in response. Agent Shalom smiled slightly. There was a predatory gleam in her eyes. Alex briefly wondered if all agents had that expression – hungry, almost wolflike – when they were on the tail of a new lead.

"My contact gave me the details," Agent Shalom said. "But like I said, the guy in charge is a real piece of work. He's also incredibly paranoid, so we would have to work our way into the good graces of the cell before we even caught a glimpse of his back."

"How do we do that?" Alex asked.

Agent Shalom held up a brown paper bag that Alex hadn't noticed beside her bed.

"Well, lucky enough for us, we may not have to _do _anything at all, per say," she told him. "Thanks to Blunt being an interfering little twat, our identities may have done the work for us."

"What do you mean?" Alex frowned. He was all for any plan that did not involve having to partake in terrorist activity to maintain a cover, but he really didn't like the idea of walking around with the identity of someone who had committed crimes like that himself.

"In the terrorist community, nothing says 'pick me' quite like a prison record before the age of eighteen," she said with a grin. "That passport you're carrying? Its real owner served two years in an Israeli prison when he was twelve and thirteen, for wrestling a gun from an Israeli soldier at the point of a Swiss army knife, and shooting the soldier. He came into contact with a militant Fatah cell while in prison, and when he got out, started building explosives for a cell in the West Bank. He was arrested again when he was sixteen for blowing up a bus in Te Aviv, the only one of several scores of explosives that the Israeli government could pin on him. He was traded back to Hammas for the dead body of an Israeli soldier, and was assassinated by a Mossad operative before he turned eighteen."

Alex had taken out the passport while Agent Shalom was talking, but tossed it away from himself when the Mossad agent finished.

"Was MI6 even going to warn me about the extra baggage on this?"

"Alex, we're here to infiltrate a terrorist organization," Agent Shalom said patiently. "They figured it could only help. If it makes you feel better, Zahrah Khalid has an even worse track record, and she was only in prison once."

Alex's eyes were fixed on the passport. How many people had this guy killed? There was only a three-year difference in their ages, but the boy whose passport he carried had killed enough people to bathe in blood if he wanted to. He felt slightly sick.

"So we won't have to kill anyone to prove who we are, at least," Alex grumbled.

"I said we may not have to," Shalom corrected, and the silence that stretched on between them was unbearable.

"You in there?" Agent Shalom asked, waving a hand in front of his face.

"What's in the bag?" Alex asked in answer, trying to distract himself.

"Some basic supplies I picked up while I was talking to my contact," Agent Shalom said. "I'm going to give you a crash course in explosives, so that you can do enough to make the cell think you are who we're saying you are."

"Don't take this the wrong way," Alex said as Agent Shalom pulled a bucket of fertilizer out of the bag, "but I can kind of see why Mossad could be easily convinced you were in on terrorist activity."

"Attend," Agent Shalom said, not addressing his comment, but smiling in response. "Fertilizer bombs are easy to make, and easy enough to get materials for, since most people in Israel use fertilizer. The key is knowing what amounts you need, in combination with other materials to make the right kind of bomb."

Alex watched as she carefully measured out fertilizer into a gallon plastic bag. The next few hours were spent with him watching attentively while Agent Shalom demonstrated the basic kinds of bombs he would be expected to make.

Several times, Alex wondered if MI6 knew what they had signed him up for, but he suppressed it, knowing that their cover might rest or fall depending on how well he remembered and was able to execute the older agent's lessons.

"Muntasir was especially good with remote detonated C4 explosives, however," Agent Shalom said, halfway through the afternoon. She explained the various ways to wire a detonator for a block of C4, or several. Alex watched her hands twist the wires in front of him deftly. He was glad she hadn't actually picked up any C4, though he wouldn't put it past her to have some hidden in some secret compartment in her bag.

"You try," she said, connecting all the wires and passing the detonator over to Alex. He looked down at the device nervously.

"Hammas won't give you any breathing room," Agent Shalom warned him.

Alex picked up the wires, and after a few minutes of fumbling and wrong turns, managed to get the wires connected in all the right places. Agent Shalom examined his handiwork.

"Sloppy, at best," she muttered. "We will work on this. Muntasir might fumble with the correct units for a fertilizer bomb, but he was an expert with electronics."

"You talk about him like you know him," Alex commented, stalling for time. His head was swimming.

"I was the agent that took Muntasir Khalid out a year ago," Agent Shalom said. The thoughtful expression had bled out of her features, leaving her face as stony as Alan Blunt's. Obviously, this was a sore spot for her, but Alex wasn't going to be kept in the dark. Not by his own partner.

"So who was Zahrah Khalid?" he asked.

"They often went as brother and sister, though they were married," she replied.

"What happened to her?" he asked.

"Mossad captured her, at first because they thought she would be a good bargaining chip against Muntasir," Agent Shalom said. "They tortured her to find out where Muntasir was. They found out that she had some strong connections in the world of terrorism while they were interrogating her, and that decided things for them."

"What happened?" Alex asked, even though he already knew.

"They killed her."

She could have been commenting on the color of a jacket she was contemplating buying, Alex thought, unnerved. It was almost scary, how detached she was. How little she cared the agency she was working so hard to get back into had tortured and killed someone they had pulled off the streets for having the wrong boyfriend. The fact that Zarah was still a criminal didn't change the fact that it left a bitter taste in Alex's mouth.

"Practice the wiring for a while," Agent Shalom said, breaking a very uncomfortable silence with a small, but encouraging smile. "If you can manage this without a hitch, I can help you through anything else they might intend for you to do. They will not become suspicious that we would work closely, given our cover," she added dryly.

Alex pulled the detonator towards him, torn. Learning how to wire a detonator might save him and Agent Shalom, and in the long run allow them to discover what information had been compromised, and who had organized the theft.

On the other, he couldn't ignore the fact that mastering this lesson might mean that people would die. Yedit couldn't be sure that they wouldn't have to kill someone to prove that they were who they said they were, and Alex didn't know if he could do it, if he could become a murderer of innocent people who were just taking the bus, or walking down a street, or buying pizza.

"I'm going to go talk to Daniels, meanwhile," Agent Shalom said, breaking through Alex's mental paralysis. "I want to appraise him of the situation and our next plan of attack, since your agency clearly has little trust for me, and would probably assume that I was leading you to your death if I ran this operation as I normally would work in deep cover."

Alex had to smile at that. Blunt would almost certainly recall this mission if he knew what Alex was being taught to do.

_On the other hand, he was the one who chose the cover ID's,_ Alex thought as Shalom closed the door behind her, and he returned his attention to the wires. _And he clearly knows something about Agent Shalom's past that she doesn't like to share. She was really upset when she saw the cover ID's, and the way she was talking about them just now…_

Alex forced himself to concentrate on the detonator. He wasn't going to be the reason this mission went sour.

_If, _his mind insisted. _If it goes sour._

Agent Shalom was back maybe twenty minutes later. Alex had taken the detonator apart and put it back together five times while she was out. His hands quickly picked up the movements, and Alex began to see their pattern for himself, instead of just memorizing by rote. It was a relatively simple pattern. Agent Shalom nodded approvingly when she saw his progress. She had come back in carrying a bag with two boxes of take-out Indian food.

"Sorry I forgot to ask what you wanted," she said. "I remembered on the way back from talking with Daniels that we haven't yet eaten lunch, and it's already one-thirty."

Alex shrugged and opened the box Agent Shalom passed him. It was some kind of chicken curry, along with a garlic naan, which tasted very good, for its part. As they ate, Agent Shalom asked Alex to demonstrate how quickly he could take the detonator apart and put it back together, and examined his handiwork, giving him a chance to eat.

"This is good, for now," she said. "You will have time to work on different wiring patterns while we wait to move into Gaza, and then while we wait to make contact with the cell we are looking for."

"When do we leave for Gaza?" Alex asked.

"A week, possibly more," Agent Shalom said. "I have arranged for us to be snuck over the border illegally. Anyone watching us will believe that we really are Muntasir and Zahrah Khalid, returned from the dead, as it were."

"And in the meantime?" Alex asked.

"You work on eating, breathing, dreaming, and living electronic explosives," Agent Shalom said.

"I actually don't think remote detonators taste that good," Alex muttered. Agent shalom placed a small booklet in Alex's hands as a response.

"Master the diagrams labeled one, two, three, six, eight, and thirteen," she said. "They will give you a template for anything else you might have to do in a hurry. The other diagrams can be extrapolated if you remember what each is for, and what the wirings are for the main kinds of bombs. Pay special attention to thirteen. When you aren't working on committing these to memory, I want you to learn as much Arabic as you can. You won't ever learn enough to speak it, not before our mission commences, but it will give you a fuzzy outline of what someone is saying."

Alex stared at the dictionary Shalom handed him. The foldout booklet of diagrams had at least twenty intricate designs for detonators, which would take him forever and a half to memorize. Learning another language on top of that?

"I didn't think I would be going back to school so soon," was what he said.

"Cheer up Alex, think of it as a learning experience," Agent Shalom said brightly. "When else are you ever going to learn Arabic, or how to make improvised explosives?"

"At least for the latter, in the case of most people, the answer is never, and for most people, they're bloody well happy to keep it like that," Alex snapped.

"Yet you and I are not like most people, are we Alex?" Agent Shalom asked, an impish gleam in her eye, even though her tone was deadly serious. Alex looked down, unable to meet her eyes.

_No, no we aren't, _Alex thought. But that thought also reminded him of how vastly different he and the mossad agent were. She was hardened; she was good at her job, and she enjoyed it. The fact that she could speak so matter-of-factly about explosives, torture, and death told him that even though he and Shalom were indeed very different from the majority of people in the world, they were by no means similar to one another.

"And what are you going to do?" he asked, more to forestall the moment when he had to knuckle down to work more than anything.

"I intend to make it clear to a few of the local cells that Zahrah Khalid is very far from dead, and I want to test your ability to work on the detonators in different circumstances that you may be exposed to in the cell. I also intend to see how well you can translate some basic Arabic."

Alex mentally groaned as he looked over at the dictionary again. He hated homework. He turned his attention to the diagrams first, looking over the diagrams Shalom had specified.

"I'm going to shake the tree a bit in some of the local cells, see what I can stir up, by letting some old contacts of Zahrah's know that she's alive," Shalom said, putting her hijab back on, and tucking a pistol into a pocket in her jacket. Alex didn't see any of the other weapons she had uncovered last night, but he had no doubt the mossad agent was better than well armed. She had probably picked up a couple of hand grenades and a rocket launcher while getting lunch, Alex thought, and took an amused moment to guess where she was hiding it all on her slight frame as she exited the motel room.

He chuckled as he began the grueling work of setting up a new detonator for the next diagram he was going to be working on, willing every aspect of the process to remain in his memory.

His fingers were bleeding from minor cuts on the detonator, and his head was throbbing but Alex had managed to get the hang of another diagram, and had memorized a few Arabic verbs, by the time Shalom returned, looking satisfied.

When he slept, Alex dreamed of moving wires around and across a circuit board.

...

**Edit: Updated as of June 8. Fixed some minor transitions, generally cleaned up the chapter to make it easier to read.**


	5. Secrets

Operation: Red Crescent – Secrets

**Lots of Hebrew in this chapter… at first I translated everything Hebrew into phonetics, but that was basically butchering the sounds, so I just wrote most of it in English – same with the Arabic.**

**I did keep some of the phonetically translated Hebrew words. It will probably still butcher the words, but all the Israelis I know (I count myself since I speak Hebrew as well as I do English) go back and forth between Hebrew and English when they are talking in either language, which makes writing exactly what they say difficult. Please bear with me on those –there are translations at the bottom for those who are curious.**

**By the way, the story about Dani at the end was a story my Modern Middle East Studies teacher, who quit law school for the Israeli army when the gulf war broke out.**

**I am not AH, unfortunately. Everything you recognize is his, everything else is mine. ALL MINE! Mwahahahaha!**

**...**

At first, Alex was not quite sure what had woken him. The room was quiet and undisturbed, without anything outstanding that could have driven him from sleep.

They had been in Egypt for seven days already, and he had begun to really get the feel for the deadly devices Agent Shalom was patiently showing him how to build. His mind no longer tuned out when listening to Arabic sentences, but rather listened sharply for the words he knew to look for.

It was still dark outside, which meant it was very late, or very early in the morning. Alex rolled over and tried to get back to sleep, but found that he couldn't.

The click of a gun cut through his frustration at not being able to go back to sleep with like a sharp knife.

Alex stiffened. He rolled over slowly, hoping to catch the intruder unawares.

He found himself facing down the barrel of a gun.

_"Get up!"_ Alex's mind swam, at first not understanding what the man had said. And then something clicked, and he recognized the Arabic words, feeling a momentary thrum of victory, before another more powerful surge of fear overwhelmed it.

He rolled out of bed slowly, careful to not make any sudden movements, remembering in time not to speak – their official story was that when he had been first captured by Mossad, they cut his vocal cords out, as Blunt had suggested.

He glanced over at the other bed in the room. Agent Shalom was gone.

_Still meeting with her contact, _Alex thought, noticing the digital clocks bright green readout – 12:03. He hoped she would hurry back, because there didn't seem to be an obvious way for him to get out of this situation.

The man holding the gun gestured to another figure just behind him. The second intruder handed the first one a plastic container. Alex saw the metal box on top – a detonator. The man with the gun passed it to Alex, and said something in Arabic. He understood only the word _disarm _in the sentence, but it was enough. There was a timer on the top of the detonator, giving him four minutes to disable it before the bomb went off.

Without hesitation, Alex reached for his Swiss army knife on the nightstand. The man with the gun said something that was clearly a warning. But Alex had no intention of wasting time trying to wrestle the gun out of the intruders hands. There was a block of C4 inside the plastic container, and he only had four minutes left on the timer before it exploded.

Alex used the knife to pry off the lid as carefully as he could, not touching any of the wires. He switched the knife so that he had the scissors.

_Diagram 8, _he thought. So far, he hadn't managed that one in under six minutes. He gulped, and carefully began the process of moving wires around carefully, cutting where he had to. He knew that one wrong move would send him up in smoke.

He felt the breath is his chest tighten, as if he were in the middle of running a very long distance. His pulse was racing madly, his nerves going out of control.

The clock ticked precariously closer to zero as he feverishly tried to remember a half-memorized diagram. Agent Shalom had been right, however. The basic set up was similar to that of another diagram - diagram two. Triumphantly, Alex cut a final wire, disabling the detonator with a large red 002 left on the clock. Two seconds.

Alex sighed in relief and lay back, glaring at the intruders. The one with the gun pulled of his mask, revealing a smiling and annoyingly familiar face. Alex tossed the disarmed bomb at Agent Shalom, his pulse still racing.

"Were you planning on exploding the building?" he demanded.

"Alex, I put clay in, not C4," Agent Shalom said seriously. "I didn't intend for you to even try to disarm the bomb. You only needed a second to check out the explosive compound to realize that it wouldn't react. Let Hammas fool you like that, and we're both dead."

"The first rule of disarming a bomb is to not waste time, Cub," the second intruder said, his voice also annoyingly familiar. So Ben had been in on it too?

"Don't either of you ever bloody _sleep?" _Alex asked desperately.

He didn't wait for an answer, but merely rolled back over, trying to calm his racing pulse. This time, sleep took him almost instantly.

It was three days later when the smugglers came; the sun had already fallen. Alex and Agent Shalom had already packed their worn – looking backpacks, leaving most of what they had brought behind; all they had was a change of clothes each, a gun, and (in Alex's case) explosive materials and wiring for detonators. They were officially acting the parts of Zahrah and Muntasir Khalid.

"Salaam," Agent Shalom said, greeting the two smugglers. They nodded their greeting and preceded to explain the plan in rapid Arabic. Alex listened intently, pretending he understood. Agent Shalom had already explained what the process would be; they would be driving to a shipyard, where they would be hidden inside shipping containers that would be driven over the border into Gaza by truck. Once in Gaza, they would be set up with new identities, and would part ways with the smugglers. It sounded almost too easy, Alex thought, and that made him nervous. If they were found at the border, he wasn't sure which would be worse – finding out that their cover had held up, or someone recognizing Agent Shalom.

From there, Agent Shalom would contact the terrorist cell, pretending she and Alex had just broken out of jail, and had snuck into Gaza to join the resistance against Israeli occupation once again.

The smugglers had finished their explanation. Agent Shalom nodded, and handed them a case filled with what Alex knew was cash – American dollars. They followed the smugglers into the van.

One of the smugglers motioned for them to go first into the van. The other smuggler got into the van behind him, and the first one closed the door and walked over to the drivers seat.

They had been moving for the better part of an hour when the smuggler pulled out his gun. The movement was subtle enough Alex might have missed him going for the weapon, but a second later, it was pointed deliberately in his direction.

Alex heard Agent Shalom sharply inhale, going for her own gun. The ominous click of the safety on the smuggler's weapon made her freeze.

The smuggler said something, but he wasn't speaking in Arabic anymore. The language sounded middle-eastern, but there was a clear shift. Alex wondered if it was Hebrew.

Agent Shalom muttered something under her breath in Hebrew – it sounded a little like 'Zonah*.'

"Did you think you were going to run forever, _Yedit_?" the smuggler asked in English. His voice sounded sad. "You had to run back to Hammas, after everything?"

"I told you Dani, I am innocent," Agent Shalom snapped.

"Yet you have taken up your old identity, you have gotten in touch with all your old questions, and here we find you attempting to sneak across the border into Gaza," the man – who Alex knew must be another Mossad agent - said calmly.

_What? _Alex shot a confused look at Agent Shalom. Dani shook his head.

"You had to drag a child into your deception?" he asked.

"There is no deception!" Agent Shalom hissed. Her voice changed, taking on a pleading tone. "Dani, we have worked together for two years. I have placed my life in your hands many times, and you have trusted me likewise. Believe me now when I say that I have not betrayed you. I have not betrayed Israel. Be'emet.* How could you believe that of me?"

"Everything was a lie!" Dani answered.

"What's going on?" Alex asked, thoroughly confused now.

"Dani has been my partner for all my years at Mossad," Agent Shalom said bitterly. "It seems he is the one assigned to bring me back in. And unless I am mistaken, he intends to threaten me by implicating you should I continue to claim my innocence, and hide the information he thinks I stole from Mossad."

Dani inclined his head, keeping the gun level, not denying Agent Shalom's assessment.

"Ya'alah*, I have said this already – I know_ nothing _Dani!"

"And I have said already that I don't believe you," Dani said. He looked at Alex.

"My _partner _has neglected to tell you, I'd wager, that before she worked for Mossad, she was a high ranking Hammas agent," Dani's voice was full of venom as he spoke. "She was captured on a raid, and given a new identity in exchange for giving up her boyfriend, an explosives expert in Gaza. She became a valuable informant on Hammas after that, until the day came when we actually _trusted _her,"

Alex snapped his head around to look at Agent Shalom for confirmation; she was glaring at Dani.

_Zahrah Khalid. That's why she spoke as if she knew them,_ Alex realized, his stomach plummeting. Suddenly, Blunt's distrust of the agent seemed to make sense. Agent Shalom was a mole in Hammas. More than a mole - she had _been _Hamas until... Until what? She'd been taken off the streets, tortured, and promised a chance to live in exchange for her cooperation. Until she'd been used to kill a man she'd loved, and turned against Hammas.

Did her past crimes make her guilty now? Alex thought of the many lessons she had given him in explosives and the many times he had wondered how she knew all of this.

She had known it all because boyfriend had been Muntasir Khalid, a man who had killed many scores of people with the same techniques Agent Shalom was teaching Alex. Zahrah had not had hands free of blood, either.

But he also remembered the revulsion in her eyes as she had spoken of the murders her dead husband had committed. He remembered the flatness in her voice when she spoke of the torture and murder of Zahrah Khalid. She had not liked either of those people, clearly. And though she might have been lying to Alex, he still didn't think that she was guilty. Not of betraying Israel after being made an agent.

Dani tossed a pair of handcuffs to Agent Shalom.

"Put those on," he ordered.

"Not on your life," she answered. "I will not hand myself back to Mossad while they still believe falsely in my guilt. Not while the enemies of Israel could be in possession of information that could bring down my home. And I have been tortured once already by Mossad, and I have no desire to repeat the experience."

"You are not being given a choice," Dani said, adding a phrase in Hebrew that sounded like it was a plea for Agent Shalom to be reasonable.

Dani's eyes weren't on Alex. They were focused entirely on his fellow Mossad agent, correctly assessing that she was the greater threat. Alex bit his lip, second guessing himself for a single second, wondering if he was really doing the right thing. He allowed himself only that second, however, because he knew he only had the one opportunity.

He lashed out with his feet, knocking the gun from Dani's hands, and sending the older agent crashing to the floor of the van. He cried out in Hebrew, but Agent Shalom cut off the cry with a slam from the butt of the gun she had grabbed. He went down like a light, unconscious in the back of the van.

"You just made yourself as much of a target as I am," Agent Shalom said quietly.

"That won't matter when we find out who actually stole the information," Alex answered. "In the meantime, we should move before the driver notices anything."

_Please, don't let my trust be badly founded, _Alex thought desperately. _Please don't let me be wrong about this._

Agent Shalom pulled open the back door of the van, peeking out.

"Lets go, now," she suggested, pushing it all the way open. They were moving down a deserted lane, already outside the city. He leaped after Agent Shalom, landing arm on his arm and wincing from the pain.

"Run!" Agent Shalom said, pulling him to his feet. As the dust cleared around them, Alex saw the figure of an old parking structure that they were heading towards.

"We just need to get out of sight before he checks his mirror," Agent Shalom said, pushing through the undergrowth that surrounded the building. Clearly, it had not been used in a very long time.

They didn't stop running until they were safely inside. Agent Shalom reached into her bag and pulled out the pistol she had brought with them from the hotel, and checked to make sure it was loaded. Her hands were shaking, and the gun nearly slipped out of her grasp.

Alex, meanwhile, glanced out the window. The van had stopped, and the other agent had gotten out of the front, his gun in his hand. He went around back, and saw Dani unconscious inside. The agent looked around, and headed off on the right side of the road in the opposite direction Alex and Agent Shalom had went.

"We're safe, for now, I think," Alex called.

"I'm sorry you got mixed up in all of this, Alex," Agent Shalom said. She seemed to have steadied herself.

"Its not like MI6 has ever given me a choice in anything they've sent me into," Alex answered bitterly. His minds eye was focused on a collage of images that ran together until there was no distinction – Mr. Grin, threatening him at knifepoint on Harold Sayle's orders; Dr. Grief, informing him that he would be used for human dissection; Watching Alexi Sarov set up an explosive device next to several rusted nuclear submarines, while he was handcuffed nearby, helpless to stop it; running through Damian Cray's twisted real life version of his new videogame; struggling to keep himself from falling into Desmond McCain's crocodile pit…

Agent Shalom considered him for a moment and shook her head, chuckling. Alex looked up incredulously – surely, she had to know that his anger at MI6 was more than childish petulance!

"You remind me so much of me when I was eighteen," she said in answer to his look. "I was angry at Mossad. It had been a one time thing, they had promised; if I helped them take out Muntasir, they would leave me alone. I agreed, because I was already done with Hammas. I wanted out, and you cannot simply walk away from Hammas. But Mossad kept sending me back, and each time I went deep undercover, I came back just a little more damaged. And then one morning I woke up to see a gun pointed in my face, and I was informed that I was under arrest for selling state secrets to the Iranian government."

Agent Shalom snorted. "I would have never even fallen under suspicion if Mossad had let me go my separate way – they put me in a situation where I was forced to play the role of a traitor, and then labeled me as one."

Alex felt the anger subside as easily as it had risen.

"So why are you going through all this just to get your job back?" He asked. He couldn't imagine it. If MI6 had decided to arrest him for being a traitor after coming back from Scorpia, he couldn't imagine wanting to clear his name so that he could go _back._

"I believe in Israel, Alex," Agent Shalom said. "It is my home. And I believe against all odds, and despite all evidence to the contrary, that a lasting peace can be forged, if it is possible to root out those who oppose peace under any circumstance on each side. And if I return damaged from my work, then it is only repayment for the damage I have done to others when I was part of Hammas."

Alex didn't know how to answer that. They sat together in silence for a little bit, until the sound of an engine firing made them both start.

"They're leaving," Agent Shalom said, going to the window to see what was going on. "Probably to get some backup. We should be moving now. We can still make it to Gaza by dark tomorrow on our own if we go quickly."

"And how do we do that, exactly?" Alex asked.

"Hammas has a intricate system of tunnels crossing the Egyptian-Israeli border. Its heavily mined on both sides, and Israel keeps a sharp eye for tunnel exits on their end, but they will not have such good security on the Gaza side of the border."

Alex followed Agent Shalom at a brisk pace to the opposite side of the parking structure. A possible problem occurred to him as they went.

"Correct me if my geography is a little off, but isn't the Sinai desert between us and Gaza?" he asked. Agent Shalom smiled.

"It would be, if our plan was to go through the Sinai," she said. "We will take a train to Ismailia, and hike from there to Port Sa'id, sleep there, and then take a boat until we reach Al Arish. From there, we will hike until we reach one of the tunnels I know of, and we will use it to arrive in Gaza."

"I'm not going to lie, that was complete gibberish," Alex said as they left the parking structure.

"Then just follow me," Agent Shalom said.

Alex had to wonder if Agent Shalom's sence of direction was something that had been pounded into her by Mossad, or if it was natural born ability. She didn't once consult a map, or a compass, but she seemed to know exactly where they were and where they were going at any given time.

As the sun fully cleared the horizon, Agent Shalom had steered them towards a train station in Cairo, and they had taken a train from Cairo into Ismailia, a major city on their way to their final destination. Agent Shalom had been tense the whole train ride, seeming to see enemies behind every corner. Alex himself was jittery, wondering how Mossad had not already caught track of them. Surely they would know which direction they were headed in, and know to watch that path carefully?

When he raised this thought to Agent Shalom as they ate lunch in Ismailia, she shrugged. She had relaxed the second they had stepped off the train, seeing no agents around them.

"Mossad is betting that I will not go through the cities," she said. "Remember, he believes I am working with Hammas now. To him, it does not make sense that I would go through populated areas when I could run into the desert and disappear with my cohorts. If Mossad was watching the route we are following, they would have grabbed us on the train, or once we stepped off. The fact that they are not in Ismailia in force tells me that they will be watching only the border, and that is useless, because we will not be crossing in a conventional sense."

In Ismailia, they had purchased basic supplies like sunscreen and water bottles, because they would be hiking the rest of the distance to Port Sa'id to avoid attracting attention. It was mid-afternoon when they set off again, and they would be walking well into the night, because it was almost 78 kilometers between Islailia.

Alex wished he had better cover from the harsh Egyptian sun. Even though he knew the sunscreen would protect him from getting burned, it was still hot as hell. Agent Shalom herself didn't seem disturbed by the heat. At the very least, she was walking at a grueling pace that forced Alex to really work to keep up.

"What kind of training do they make you do at Mossad?" Alex asked at one point, very late into the afternoon, more to distract himself than anything. They had been following the Suez Canal for maybe an hour, and the late afternoon sunlight gleamed off of the water and the boats that traveled up and down across it. They had been walking already for almost six hours, all told, at that point, at a brisk pace, and Alex was starting to feel the fatigue get to him. Between the sun and the grueling hike, Alex didn't know how much more he had left in him.

Much of the road they were following went through populated and developed areas, but the need for them to remain out of sight had vanished. They blended in almost perfectly, and no one gave them the second, closer glance that would reveal that they in fact were not locals. Alex felt comfortable to voice the question, knowing no one was listening to hear him speak in English.

"If I told you, I'd have to kill you," Agent Shalom said, a smile spreading across her face.

"No, seriously," Alex pressed.

"I am being serious," Shalom said. "The specialized training at Mossad is even more of a secret than the training you must have received before going into the field."

Alex had a flash of memory - four burly SAS soldiers with attitude problems, days spent crawling through the mud and rain, and kicking Wolf out of an airplane - before being brought back to the present in time to focus on the conversation.

"Well, what do you guys do?" Alex asked. "The official, on the record stuff they actually talk about. Because I know that MI6 handles only one aspect of our intelligence network and mostly handles foreign threats. What's Mossad responsible for?"

"Mostly the same thing your CIA does," Shalom offered. "Though we have many units responsible for different areas of intelligence as well. For example, I am a member of Kidon."

"Kidon?"

"Most Kidon agents are highly trained for one purpose – to take out the enemies of Israel who cannot be legally tried because they are seeking refuge with her Arab neighbors," Agent Shalom answered with a grin. "The physical training alone is grueling. And when you are an agent of Mossad - not just of Kidon, but any branch - you cannot tell anyone, even your family. Many times, that secret is carried with you to your grave."

Alex thought of Ian's coffin being lowered into a grave, a Union Jack folded neatly over it. If MI6 had not needed to use him, would he ever have known that his uncle was a spy?

"Take Dani as an example," Agent Shalom continued. "He came to Mossad straight out of the army, and just told his wife he renewed his tour in the army. He has three children, the oldest of whom is only five. If he is killed on duty, all four of them will be told he was killed during a mission for the IDF. They will never know the truth of what he does."

"What about you?" Alex asked. "What do you tell your family?" He regretted the question almost immediately, seeing the expression on the older agents face darken. But then again, it had been a very personal question.

"Muntasir was the only family I ever had," she said flatly. "And Dani. But I never had to give my excuses to Muntasir, since he was dead by the time I was working for Mossad, and Dani was my partner."

"And you?" she asked, taking a deep breath and smiling, washing away the almost painfully wistful expression on her face. "What do you tell your parents when you vanish for long stretches of time and come home bruised and exhausted?"

"My parents were killed when I was a kid, and an assassin murdered my uncle a year ago," Alex said. He tried to make the reality sound less painful than it was, but just saying the words brought the painful images back up to his mind, constructing ins throat and chest. "There's really nothing to tell anyone anymore."

"They were all agents?" Agent Shalom asked. Alex nodded.

"So it seems that spying is in your blood," Agent Shalom said. Alex smiled, because Jack had said something very similar right before Desmond McCai had kidnapped him – _You have too much of a spy in you. It's all your fathers fault, and your uncles. And your grandfather's – for all we know, he was a spy too!_

They walked for another hour in silence as the afternoon wore on. The other side of the Canal seemed to be nothing more than desert, though there was an industrial section of town where they were walking. He was grateful - the large buildings left long shadows in the very late afternoon sun, giving more cover from the heat and the light.

The sun was dangerously close to the horizon now. The brilliant oranges and pinks of the sunset were spreading across the sky, illuminating the one or two wayward clouds that strayed across it. Even exhausted as he was, Alex thought it was pretty. He wished he could take a picture for Jack – she would have liked to see it.

By the time the sun had fully set, Agent Shalom announced that they were approaching the town of Rash al Ushsh. That meant nothing to Alex, but when Agent Shalom told him they only had 13 kilometers left to go, he was shocked.

They had walked almost 65 kilometers in a day. How long had they been walking? Nine hours, ten? That was still incredible. And near impossible.

"We'll reach Port Said in an hour, maybe two," Agent Shalom said. "We can slow down a bit now, and eat in Rash al Ushsh before heading on."

"And tomorrow?" Alex asked.

"Tomorrow we get on a boat for Al Arish. We would never make the distance on foot – its over 220 kilometers."

Alex felt relief wash over him as they stumbled into Rash al Ushsh. He was exhausted, and when he went to wash his hands in a restroom, he made the unpleasant discovery that his arms were coated in a layer of dirt and salt - the salt having built up from all the sweat that he had lost throughout the day. His legs felt as weak as a newborn colt's, but they still had some ways to go before they could stop.

The two agents ate pita and falafel from a stand on the side of the road, each of them downing three bottles of water before they continued on in the dark. Where the heat had been overwhelming, now Alex worried about the cold. Staying in motion kept them reasonably warm, but the layer of sweat that had built up over the day chilled his skin and made him shiver.

"Dani used to tell me about his days in the army," Agent Shalom said as they moved on after refilling their water bottles from a fountain. "He once said that during training, his commanding officer made his unit run a hundred kilometers through the desert, and every 8 kilometers, each of them had to drink a whole gallon of water. If they spilled any, or refused to drink it, their commander would make the whole unit run another kilometer. He said that for a week after, the very thought of water made him ill, but nobody in the unit every complained about training exercises again."

Alex thought about their long trek that day, and wondered what kind of shape those soldiers had been in, to run that far across desert terrain. He wondered how recruits in the IDF would compare against the SAS trainees that he had worked with, and smiled to himself. Despite the hours of hiking across rough terrain, and extensive weapons training they received, in a battle of Wolf against Agent Shalom, he honestly didn't know which one of them would walk away alive.

Alex was totally spent by the time they reached Port Sa'id. Agent Shalom had been supporting him much of the way there, his body steadfastly refusing to continue forward of its own volition.

He felt like he was asleep before he even reached the bed in the motel Agent Shalom had found.

...

_*Zonah is a rough transliteration for the word 'bitch in Hebrew. Agent Shalom actually used the phrase 'Ben Zonah' which means son of a bitch, but we can forgive Alex for not catching the whole thing._

_*Be'emet means 'in truth' in Hebrew._

_*Ya'alah is slang in Hebrew and Arabic. It basically means 'come on,' and is usually used as an expression of disbelief or impatience; you place the stress on the second a when annoyed. It can also be said as just yalah, which is usually a more affectionate usage._

**Edit: Updated as of June 8, minor spelling and grammar stuff.**


	6. Too Late, Too Late

Operation: Red Crescent – Too Late, Too Late

**Hey guys! I'm procrastinating a major essay on 1984, Brave New World, and We, to bring you this chapter, so I expect you all to freaking enjoy it. Because the essay is due at midnight, and I may have actually not finished the books yet****. Fanfiction procrastination for the win!**

**But that's besides the point.**

**Anyway, I'm sorry for Agent Shalom's rant on politics. I think she understands Alex very well at this point, and she knows he's about a stones throw from saying 'fuck it all.' And I think she needs Alex to understand why Mossad and MI6 need people like them.**

**Here is the next chapter in my Operation: Red Crescent series! Thank you all, by the way, for your wonderful reviews! A gigantic hug and an e-cookie to all of you, along with this update!**

******Here you go!**

**...**

Alex felt like he had been hit with a bus when he got up the next morning. His legs buckled the first time he tried to stand, not ready for the pain that would accompany the movement. Even Agent Shalom was looking a little out of sorts, wincing as she stretched the pain out of her overworked body.

_Why the hell are my arms sore? _Alex wondered as he copied Yedit's idea and stretched his body. His muscles screamed from the exertion. The respect Alex had been feeling last night for the IDF soldiers in Agent Shalom's story doubled as he managed to pull himself upright.

"Just another relaxing stroll in the sunshine," Agent Shalom said, her lips pulled into a forced smile.

Alex just stared at the attempt at humor.

"Now I understand why Mossad wasn't following us – they assume you're fucking _sane_," he said.

"It gets easier as you start to move around," she answered. "It's the worst first thing in the morning, because you've been inert after so much action."

_That's what she said,_ Alex thought. He opened his mouth to say that, and then shut it. Tom would have found it hilarious. He doubted the hardened Mossad agent would.

Instead, he focused on getting his muscles to work properly again.

Despite the sunscreen and layer of skin coloring, he had still gotten some pretty spectacular burns on his face, arms and neck. The damaged skin was almost as painful as his sore muscles.

Agent Shalom passed him a blue jar.

"Rub this on your legs, and it'll help," she advised. Alex took her advice, though the smell of the substance in the jar was entirely foul.

"What the heck is this?" he asked.

"It's a little like Vicks, but much stronger," Agent Shalom said. "They use it in the army, and its every mossad trainee's best friend."

Alex had to admit that by the time they got to the port, with the sun just beginning to lighten the horizon, he was feeling much better. He and Agent Shalom ate a quick breakfast before getting tickets on a boat that would take them to Al Arish. It stopped in several cities along the way, but it was the fastest way forward. Alex sat back on deck and enjoyed being immobile for a while as the two fugitives waited for the boat to take off.

He must have dozed off, because when he woke up again, the boat was moving, and the sun was high in the sky. Alex looked around for Agent Shalom, and saw her leaning against the railing. He went to join her. She was looking out at the Egyptian coast.

"Some of the most beautiful beaches in the world are along this coast," Agent Shalom said quietly, speaking softly so no one else on the ship would hear her speaking English.

"All the way up to the Golan, in the north of Israel, there are gorgeous beaches. I was once in Gushkatif, before the disengagement from Gaza, and you would be hard-pressed to find a city that was more beautiful." There was something incredibly sad in the agent's voice. Sad and angry.

"The settlers of the city grew plants and vegetables from the sand! They purified the salt water from the sea so that they could use it to water their crops as a way to fight the water shortages. And when Israel pulled out of Gaza, I was one of the Hammas agents that went in to destroy what the settlers had not. _I helped _the bastards that turned Gaza into a base to launch rockets into Sderot. Over 10,000 missiles landed in that city alone over the course of one year. And when Israel went into Gaza, to stop the rockets, the world called her a monster, despite the fact that any of them would have declared war when the very first rocket fell. They accused Israel of violating human rights – Israel, the country that would not allow its soldiers to bomb a building that was holding rockets inside if there were civilians? The enemies of Israel hide in hospitals and childcare centers. They hide their weapons in ambulances, and then scream of violations of human rights when Israel forces ambulances to go through checkpoints."

Alex was shocked to see Agent Shalom actually crying. She seemed to realize where she was, and wiped the tears away, smiling as if that made it better.

"And yet Israel will not integrate the West Bank into her borders for the simple reason that she cannot accept an Arab majority in a Jewish country. She refuses to recall the settlers that incite violence in lands that are not their own, beyond the legal borders of Israel. Both sides have done great wrong to each other, but the world forgives only one side of those wrongs," she said.

Alex didn't know what to say.

"I'm sorry," Agent Shalom said. "I just – you are young, you don't understand. But there _are _things that are worth dying for. You are far younger than anyone would have to be when they make the kind of choices that lead them to such crossroads, but you stand there, nonetheless. Do not make the mistake I made, Alex. MI6 are not pleasant. Alan Blunt is even more repulsive than my own director. But they are repulsive, because it takes a certain kind of person to keep up a fight that should have been lost a long time ago. And it is a fight that _must _be fought, regardless of the cost."

Alex looked out at the clear beaches. White sand stretched up and down the coast, even though this wasn't an area with many resorts. It _was _beautiful. He couldn't even imagine a place where people had managed to coax life from the sandy and salty beaches under such a blistering sun. It seemed impossible.

"Fighting a loosing battle against the world embitters men and women like us," Yedit said quietly, following Alex's gaze back out to the coasts of Egypt. "It is not an easy or an enviable burden they carry."

Alex watched the coast go by for several kilometers. It was mesmerizing, calming.

If nothing else, it was a reminder that there was a real world out there, beyond the life of shadows and lies that seemed to have trapped him. It was painful, to see families walking around deck, smiling and happy, knowing that he would never be a part of that world.

Yet even the knowledge that there _was _some sort of normality calmed Alex's nerves, allowed him to steel himself for what was to come. He was throwing himself back into the belly of the beast.

It was afternoon when they finally docked at Al Arish and had lunch. It was a huge and busy coastal town, and Alex would have immediately gotten lost in its many twists and turns, but Agent Shalom led him expertly through the throngs. They took another train, this one into the city of Sheik Zuwayid. Agent Shalom led Alex to the outskirts of the city, pointing out into the desert.

"We follow this highway for an hour, at most, before turning off," she said. "It will not take long to find the tunnel, if it is still there, and from there, it is a straight walk into Gaza."

Alex's legs burned at the thought of more walking, but he followed the Mossad agent down the highway, determined to keep up. By nightfall, they would be deep into enemy territory. Neither spoke as the sun sank lower in the sky. Alex felt a pang of fear as Agent Shalom steered them off the road and into the open desert, but he forced himself back to calm. The Mossad agent clearly knew what she was doing.

The tunnel _was _easy enough to locate. They had been walking away from the road for maybe half an hour when Agent Shalom issued an exclamation of triumph, and lifted a tarp out of the sand. Alex would have never seen it if it had not been pointed out to him, but looking now, it was obvious. There was sand glued down to it so it would not be blown away, and it was hooked down underneath, so the tarp remained in place. It was simple, yet brilliant.

The tunnel was little more than a hole, with steps dug into the side. Agent Shalom motioned for Alex to go first. She paused to hook the tarp back into place above them before following him down.

The tunnel went deep, and it was very narrow. Alex remembered climbing up the chimney at Point Blanc, and nearly froze for fear. But he kept climbing, hoping that the tunnel itself wouldn't be quite as narrow.

His hopes were vindicated. When he dropped to the floor, the tunnel was high enough for him to stand, and wide enough that he could reasonably stretch out his arms. The whole setup was held by wooden bracings placed periodically, with lamps every couple of yards. Agent Shalom took the lead ahead now. Again, she seemed to know exactly where to go, ignoring many misleading forks and turns that would have had Alex lost almost immediately. He wondered if the agent had photographic memory, and he would have asked, if he hadn't been so afraid that someone else would hear.

More silence, but this silence felt oppressive, imposed, rather than companionable, as the hike down the highway had been. Even with the lamps, it was very dark, and the periodic lighting served to make the tunnel more eerie rather than providing significant light.

They walked for a very long time. Alex had no way of tracking the passage of time, and their pace soon became monotonous. He had to stop himself several times from falling asleep in his tracks.

He didn't know how much later it was when Agent Shalom took a turn, and stopped by a set of steps cut into the wall, disappearing into a dark hole in the ceiling.

"Alex," she said, her voice very calm. There was an edge of fear to her voice. "I would not ask this normally, but our cover is a delicate one – that we were captured and tortured by Mossad is a story that must be believed. There is no faking an injury – it is too easy to be caught in the lie. These are dangerous people we are dealing with."

"And we need to look like we were actually tortured," Alex finished. He understood. His heart was pounding – the anticipation of the pain made his whole body reject the notion vehemently, but he agreed with Agent Shalom's assessment.

"So who gets the honor of throwing the first punch?" He asked. Agent Shalom gulped. It was clear she dreaded the pain as much as Alex did.

"Depends on who feels strong enough to throw the second," she said shakily. She was seriously unhinged.

"Right, I think I'll go first then," Alex said. "Tell me when you're ready."

Agent Shalom closed her eyes, bracing herself. She dug her heels in against the wall and sealed her lips resolutely.

"Try not to break anything important," she said, and nodded.

Every single aspect of Alex's being went against what happened next. Ian had raised him to never hit a lady, and his instructors had always pressed upon him that martial arts were to be used _defensively_. This felt so wrong.

But Alex also knew that the worse they looked, the better their cover came across. He lashed out.

Agent Shalom didn't even cry out once. Her eyes remained shut the whole time. When Alex stepped back, hardly daring to review his handiwork, she opened her eyes and moved away from the wall, which was lightly splattered with her blood. She moved carefully – Alex was sure he had cracked a rib.

"Your turn," she said grimly. Determined to endure the necessary beating as soundlessly as Agent Shalom, Alex braced himself as she had.

The first blow was enough to make him want to sink to his knees and faint. It struck him right in the middle. The rain of punches and kicks landed everywhere. Alex even felt the skin on his face cut, but he kept his eyes shut, not wanting to see his own blood, to see the injured Mossad agent inflicting the same pain he had on her. Something cut at his throat, and despite the fact that Alex knew Agent Shalom was only helping, he wanted to fight back. He stirred momentarily, but forced himself to remain still.

When the beating stopped, he opened his eyes, stumbling forward.

"Right," Alex said. His voice was hoarse. He couldn't meet the other agents eyes, so he didn't know that she too was avoiding his gaze.

"Up the rabbit hole we go," Agent Shalom said at an attempt at humor. Alex followed as she took the lead in climbing up the steps that vanished into a hole in the ceiling.

Alex followed with a certain amount of trepidation, his mind back on the mission. What if they were caught now? Even MI6 would not be able to help him. They were officially breaking the law, and if they were caught, it was over.

It was nighttime outside. The world around them was eerily quiet. Alex took a welcome breath of fresh air, looking up at the clear night sky. Never had he seen so many stars. The milky way was a brilliant white belt across the sky, very clear against the darkness.

It was because he was looking up rather than around that Alex actually jumped when he heard the click of a gun, and whirled around.

For the third time in two days, he found himself staring down the barrel of a gun. But the man on the other side of the gun wasn't looking hostile, more curious. He said something in Arabic, which Agent Shalom responded to in kind. There was another exchange, and the man put down his gun. Agent Shalom glared at the man and muttered a phrase under her breath that sounded like it could not have been polite. The man tried not to look offended, but he beckoned for them to follow him.

"Success," Agent Shalom breathed into Alex's ear. It was hardly audible ever over the light wind, and there was no way the man would have heard her. Alex nodded to show he had gotten the message, and walked next to Agent Shalom, trying to look like he knew exactly what was going on.

They met up with a pair of guards after walking for about five minutes. More Arabic exchanged – the men with guns addressed Agent Shalom, but cast him almost awed looks clearly Agent Shalom had pulled out their reputation – and they were led on.

Their final destination was a cave, not far from the tunnel exit. Agent Shalom walked in boldly, and Alex followed her lead.

There were a few men seated inside, their faces obscured by scarves tied around their necks and faces. Their eyes narrowed when Alex and Agent Shalom entered. The man that had originally found them said something in Arabic. Alex couldn't catch even a word of the rapidly spoken foreign language, and quickly realized that his preparation for following along in Arabic was utterly useless. He tried to follow voice inflections and hand gestures instead, with reasonably more success.

One of the men with their faces obscured stood – Alex presumed he was the man in charge, at least of this little gathering, because he spoke with authority, and the others seemed to make an effort to listen to him. He and Agent Shalom exchanged a few phrases, and the eyes smiled above the scarf – kafia – Alex remembered.

"As-salaamu, Zahrah!" he exclaimed.

"As-salaamu wa rehmat Allah barakatahu*, Alir!" Agent Shalom said, sounding very surprised, though she was doing a good job of playing it off as a good kind of surprise. The two held a loud conversation rapid Arabic – they had met before. Alex's stomach sank – was their cover blown? As the two spoke, Alir's hand went up to touch the bruise on the side of Agent Shalom's face (remembering his cover, Alex found it within him to glare pointedly at Alir). When the two had finished talking, the terrorist turned to Alex.

"Muntasir?" he asked; confirmation, not recognition. Alex nodded, and the tension loosened. This man did not know Muntasir Khalid – not personally. Agent Shalom spoke in Arabic again, and Alex knew she was telling Alir their cover – their joint capture and escape from Mossad.

Alir nodded, listening closely. When Agent Shalom stopped talking, his eyes were glued to Alex. He said something that could have been an apology and barked an order to two of the other men in the cave. They came back with a box of supplies.

Alex's heart raced as the man addressed him. In the rapid Arabic, he caught one or two words, which resonated with the chart Agent Shalom had given him.

_Diagram 13, _his mind supplied readily. He was being tested. Which made sense. Alir knew Agent Shalom as Zahrah Khalid. But he, Alex, could be anyone, even a spy for all he knew. Alex was going to have to prove himself on his own merits.

He walked over to the box. There was an art to pretending to walk with a limp, much like trying to act drunk. There is a temptation to exaggerate, to prove that the disability exists, when in reality, most people fight injuries and intoxication from impeding them. It's a delicate balance, aided greatly when one is actually injured. Alex reached into the bag slung over his shoulder, and put on a pair of gloves Agent Shalom had supplied him – definitely looked used, worn from wear, and spotted with chemical spills. Alex wondered where she had gotten them, but hadn't bothered to ask.

He reached into the crate and pulled out six blocks of C4 explosives. He delicately unwrapped the plastic casing – following directions he had read and never done before. He worked deliberately, hoping that his care made up for his lack of speed. There was a back of nails in the box too. He embedded these into the C4, along with sharp metal shreds. This was a bomb meant only to kill. Alex refused to think about it.

He turned his attention to the detonator, his mind blanking for a second – what kind of detonator had it used? To buy himself time, he rummaged around in the crate, as if taking stock of his materials. He moved with smooth, graceful gestures, not hurrying, but not dallying either. Muntasir Khalid would not have balked under the pressure, and nor would Alex, filling his shoes.

_Remote, _he guessed, reaching for a circuit board. He prayed he was right. The wiring was one of the easier ones he had learned, and it took him under ten minutes to assemble the whole bomb, and sync it with a makeshift remote.

When he was done, he nodded, drawing away from the completed device.

Alir looked at his work carefully, his eyes smiling again. He was much warmer towards Alex when he turned back to the two agents. He issued more orders, and two of his men led Alex and Agent Shalom deeper into the cave. They had a pile of supplies in back, and they passed Alex and Agent Shalom each a sleeping bag, and pointed out an area where they could sleep. Agent Shalom thanked them, and then they were alone.

"They believe us," Agent Shalom breathed.

"Thank god," Alex breathed back, rolling out his sleeping bag.

"Tomorrow, I will ask Alir about the information," Agent Shalom said. "This cell is part of a larger network of cells that operates in Gaza. Even if they don't know anything, the head of the whole organization, the one I told you about in Cairo, he will. We must get to him before it is too late."

Those words echoed in Alex's head as he tried to sleep.

_Too late, too late._

How many days had it been since the information had gone missing? Yet he had to believe it was possible for them to still recover it, or the breaths of the woman next to him were heavily numbered. And Alex did not – at this point could not – believe Agent Shalom was a traitor.

_Too late, too late._

He shuddered.

When Alex finally slept, his dreams were dark and troubled.

...

_*Which means 'Peace be upon you with Allahs mercy and blessings'._

_**Edited June 25 - I fixed some spelling errors and a plot hole that I had missed. **_


	7. Khawan

Operation: Red Crescent – Khawan

**Yay, thank you all for your wonderful reviews! Keep them coming so I can keep procrastinating… Please? XD**

**A NOTE ON PRAYER IN THIS CHAPTER: Agent Shalom is saying the Modeh Ani and Shema when she wakes up. The first is a prayer you say before getting up in the morning every day. It thanks god for returning your soul to you after being asleep (it comes from this Jewish tradition that when you sleep, your soul rests with god). The second is a prayer you have to say twice a day, morning and night. Aside from the ten commandments, it is the most important pieces of biblical liturgy in Judaism, and it is an affirmation in the unity of Israel, and the belief in the god that took our people out of egypt, and it acts as a recitation of some of the most important tenants of our faith. **

**WASHING OF THE HANDS: it is both Islamic and Jewish custom to wash the hands before morning prayer. Agent Shalom says the Hebrew prayer before continuing with the Muslim ritual.**

**Washing in the Islamic world is considered spiritually cleansing, and a sign of respect for God, because it shows that you are making yourself holy before attempting to speak with the man upstairs. Ditto in Judaism.**

**ON DIRECTION: The reason for facing East is to pray to Mecca, because that is where salvation will come (same goes for why Jews face Jerusalem). **

**Prayer five times a day is obligatory in Islam, and only three in Judaism. I like to think Agent Shalom interposes Islamic and Jewish liturgy when she prays, even when she is alone and not in danger. Her years as part of Hammas, in a relationship with a major Hammas leader are as much a part of her as those she spent fighting for Israel, and both are important aspects of who she is and her spirituality.**

**********Sorry for the very long note.**

**...**

Alex woke early the next day, on his own. It looked like he was beginning to adjust to Agent Shalom's system of early days, late nights, and excessive physical stress. And then he tried to sit up, and bit back a groan.

Everything hurt. Alex's body felt like one gigantic, painful bruise. He was injured and exhausted, despite the few hours sleep he had gotten during the night, and essentially alone.

And he was sleeping in a cave with a bunch of terrorists.

The day was already turning out to be a fantastic one.

Alex rose as quietly and as slowly as he could, very conscious of the sleeping agent beside him. He glanced over at her once he was free of his sleeping bag.

Agent Shalom looked a lot younger than twenty when she was asleep. Unconsciousness erased the hard lines that defined her face. Her body was totally relaxed – when she was awake, she was always tensed, like a spring ready to fire.

Standing up, Alex stretched, wincing as he felt the bruises tugged. It wasn't too bad – nothing was broken, and the worst of the bruises weren't incapacitating. Agent Shalom had known what she was doing. That knowledge, in itself, made Alex shudder.

_Enough, _he ordered himself. He had made the decision to trust the woman, and that was that. He couldn't second guess himself every other minute now. They were in a very dangerous situation, and he needed to trust her. And she needed to trust him.

_Like Yassen trusted your father to be on his side? _A nasty voice asked him. _Like you trusted Ash?_

_Shut up, _Alex told the voice in his head.

_They worked together for years you know, and Yassen never once thought John Rider was a spy. You never even saw Ash stabbing you in the back until the knife was lodged there, good and tight. _

_Seriously, shut up, _Alex thought angrily. He wondered if he was finally starting to crack – arguing with himself in his head probably wasn't the best sign of his mental stability.

Alex heard Agent Shalom before he saw her move. She was whispering to herself, so quietly, only the echo inside of the cave cave brought the sound to Alex's attention. It was formless, unintelligible, but there. He glanced over, and saw the Agent's lips moving – in prayer, he realized. He stood, transfixed, leaning against the rough cave wall.

He had never given much thought to the idea of god. Ian hadn't been particularly religious, and hadn't attended Church regularly enough for Alex to be any more devout than his uncle. If anything, Ian's rigid belief in practicality and independence kind of went against the notion of god taking care of things. There was little in Alex's life to encourage spirituality, though if there had been, Alex thought he might be extremely bitter at god for everything that he'd suffered through.

In truth, Alex had hardly ever considered the question of god before. Even when staring down Alexi Sarov, certain beyond any shadow of doubt that he was about to die, Alex hadn't thought of praying. In the aftermath of his godfather's betrayal, he hadn't questioned god, just his own horrible luck.

Clearly, that was not the case for Agent Shalom. Alex almost felt like it was indecent to listen in, like he was witnessing something intensely personal. But there was something drew his gaze, rooted him there.

The agent finally opened her eyes. She met Alex's eyes and her lips twisted in a slight smile of acknowledgment. She had known he was there. Alex blushed, but raised his eyebrows, asking a question without words.

Shalom only shrugged as she pulled a Koran and a bottle of water out of her bag, moving a little closer to the cave entrance, where some of the men were already bent in prayer. Alex watched from the shadows as Agent Shalom used the water to wash various parts of her body, first her hands (and Alex saw her muttering again before continuing on to rinse her mouth and feet. The cave entrance was facing East – already, Alex could see the glint of the rising sun in the distance.

One of the men stood, his hands lifted to either side of his face, and sang in Arabic.

Alex felt something very old in the call, which was repeated four times, each one face in another direction –_Allah Ahkbar; _Allah is the greatest, Alex recognized_ – _before he said another line in Arabic that Alex didn't catch.

Agent Shalom had told Alex that Muntasir had not been religious in the way many Hammas agents were. His work had been mostly with Fatah, before his capture. Muntasir had been _useful _to Hammas (Alex didn't want to think about the similarity between them – how MI6 had used him just because he was _useful)_, but he had remained political rather than religious. They both hoped it was enough to hide the fact that Alex knew nothing about Islamic prayer. He hung back, watching the men and Agent Shalom praying.

Alex watched Agent Shalom's lips moving soundless as she bowed and sat up, as if the prayer were second nature to her.

Thinking of her job, Alex was sure it was. But there was something different about how she embraced this prayer. She was tense again, an agent undercover. When he had seen her pray before getting up, in Hebrew, she had been utterly relaxed, serene.

Alex sat cross-legged and sank into meditation to wait for them to finish. He allowed the world around him to dissolve, existing in his own personal space of silence and comfort. It was almost cozy, sometimes hearing the lines of Arabic prayer he could only partially understand.

He heard the men get up, their prayer finished. Alex wished that he was more proficient in Arabic, but he had never even thought about learning it before this mission, and had not had enough time in Cairo to be able to learn anything conversationally useful.

When she had finished praying, Shalom put the Koran back in her bag. him towards the entrance of the cave, where some of the men were already awake and chatting quietly. Agent Shalom cast around, and found Alir quickly. She went over to him, and immediately engaged him in a quiet, urgent discussion.

Alex only became aware of the conversation when he heard raised voices shouting. He opened his eyes, and saw Agent Shalom and Alir facing off. Agent Shalom was glaring at a man over Alir's shoulder, who was glaring back. Alir was clearly trying to stop them from killing each other. He spoke in rapid Arabic, trying to calm the situation.

Agent Shalom stormed over a few minutes later, and towered over Alex. Her position hid both of their lips, and effectively stopped anyone from listening to them.

"Alir is taking us to his boss as soon as his people finish eating," she breathed. She still looked really pissed, but her words were all but silent. Alex gave her a look that asked _what the heck was that._

Agent Shalom smiled, and said something encouraging in Arabic, a little louder; quiet enough for them to be speaking personally, yet loud enough that it was clear their conversation was strictly personal, and in Arabic.

"One of his men got all pissy about the prayer issue," she explained. "He argued that you weren't a proper Muslim if you didn't pray five times a day, and said that Alir should leave us in the desert. He also had some rather unflattering things to say about women who walk around uncovered, but I'll spare you that bit."

"Charming fellow," Alex whispered. Agent Shalom made a face.

"I convinced him to ignore the theological debate surrounding the issue," Agent Shalom said. "I reminded him that either of us could very easily kill him while he slept and make it an accident."

Alex stared. Having Muntasir's reputation was useful. But it was also very scary.

"So Alir is taking us?"

"He said he'd take us; that doesn't mean we'll be able to get in," Agent Shalom answered, glancing over her shoulder. She said something in Arabic again before continuing. "But I have high hopes."

"How well do you know this Alir guy?" Alex asked. "Will he turn on us?"

"I doubt it. He fears his boss, and his boss is not going to like it if he finds out that Alir betrayed us."

"I thought you said he didn't know you," Alex said.

"He doesn't." Agent Shaloms voice was dark, and Alex heard the secrets in it. He had to remind himself again of his commitment to trusting Agent Shalom. As frustrated as he might be, as much as he wished he knew what was going on, he had to trust his partner. She had demons in her closet, same as he did. If she didn't want to share them, that was her business. If it wasn't going to put their mission or either of them in danger (which it didn't look like it would), she could keep her secrets, and he wouldn't pry.

Alex nodded and took the hand she offered to help him stand.

They ate in silence – Agent Shalom tossed Alex a few trail bars from her bag, and he took a swig from his water bottle.

Alir lead them out of the cave to a well concealed jeep about five minutes walk away. He indicated for Alex and Agent Shalom to get in, saying something in Arabic.

Alex was quickly getting frustrated by his lack of proficiency in Arabic. He could catch a few words here and there when he listened intently, though for the most part, the native speakers around him spoke too rapidly and fluently for him to follow along closely. Agent Shalom and Alir spoke quietly with each other as Alir drove. It was obvious that they had once known each other very well. Perhaps they had been friends, back when Yedit had made a career out of bombings as Zahrah Khalid.

They arrived at the edges of a relatively large city after about half an hour. Alir drove through the streets until he reached a tall white building. It was a hospital, Alex realized. Alir turned off the jeeps engine, and said something to Agent Shalom, but he turned to include Alex in the quiet prayer – Alex recognized that he had said _Allah be with you –_ and he bowed his head in thanks. They might need the help of whatever god was listening.

Agent Shalom led the way through the hospital doors. They didn't stop at the reception desk. Agent Shalom went right into the elevator, making sure they picked up one on their own. She hit the lowest floor, which Alex presumed was the basement.

"Where are we?" Alex asked.

"At the base of operations for the biggest Hammas cell in Gaza," Agent Shalom said.

"In a hospital?" Alex asked. There was something of a cruel irony in that.

Agent Shalom didn't answer, because they had reached the bottom floor, and the doors opened. She strode forward confidently, and Alex caught the sound of a camera swiveling to take them in as they crossed a huge room, obviously used for storage. She knocked on a door to the right. The sound of her hand on metal resounded through the room.

Someone yelled something in Arabic. Agent Shalom grinned at Alex, and pulled her gun out. In one swift move, she kicked open the door.

She said something in Arabic, and then smiled manically, raising her gun in the air in a gesture of surrender.

Alex watched, wondering if the woman was genuinely insane. But she seemed to have made the right decision – none of the four guards in the room shot.

Continuing on in a very calm voice, Agent Shalom spoke in Arabic. Her voice was reasonable, but it held iron command. Alex knew she was asking the men to take her to the man in charge. Well, not really asking, he thought, with a quick glance at the harsh lines of her face and the ice in her eyes that spoke of the ease with which the woman beside him could commit violence.

_One of the guards in front of them stuttered a question._

"Zahrah Khalid," Shalom practically growled at him, and Alex realized that they had asked her what her name was.

Two of the men ran into another room off that one. The other two guards stood uncertainly holding their guns. Agent Shalom had closed the door behind them, and had stowed her gun in her belt. There was no need for it now, obviously.

Minutes ticked by. The door opened again. Many more men stepped out, and in the center of them was the boss. Alex knew it from the way he held himself, the way he surveyed the room, the way that the others glanced at him before doing anything. This man was very much _in charge, _and the men around him clearly knew it, from they way they moved in relation to him, like satellites bound to the gravity of a particularly large planet.

This was the man they had come to Gaza to see. The man who would be able to clear Yedit Shalom's innocence.

He stopped short, taking in the two agents in front of him.

"Zahrah?" the man asked. There was mild curiosity in his eyes.

Agent Shalom had none of that same curiosity. Obviously, she had been expecting to find this person here and in charge, though he was not expecting her.

"Omar?" She asked in turn. He nodded his head in affirmation as well, unable to take his eyes off of the Mossad agent.

He said something, but Alex knew it was definitely _not _in Arabic. Agent Shalom answered with a very small smile. They were speaking Hebrew.

"Your English is good then?" Omar asked.

"My training was not neglected."

"Yes, I have heard about that," Omar said. He smiled. "As I take it, you are now working as a mole for Hammas, Yedit. I heard how you ran back to them to save your own skin. Such _kavaneh*_, Director Shalom must be so proud." Omar's smile twisted into a seer. " Khawan*."

He spat. There was dark bitterness in his voice.

_Director Shalom? _Alex wondered, and he looked over at Agent Shalom, and something clicked in his head. She had run away as a teenager. Obviously, she had had an argument with her father, most likely about Mossad. She had run off to Israel's enemies, and been welcomed with open arms, having an affair with Muntasir Khalid.

And when she was captured, her father could not give the order to have her killed, so he used her rebellion to his advantage instead. Alex tried to reason through what he was hearing, but his conviction in trusting the Mossad agent was rapidly dwindling. She had clearly placed no trust in him from the beginning, and even Blunt had kept so much from him. He was used to being betrayed by MI6, but Agent Shalom was his partner. He had assumed she was telling him the truth. Maybe not all of the truth, but he hadn't been expecting to have a bomb this size dropped on him.

Another worry was that clearly, their cover meant nothing now, but Alex remained silent, watching.

Where did Omar fit into this complicated web?

"I ran back to Mossad so that I could betray them in the most painful and humiliating way possible," Agent Shalom snarled, her face dark with rage. Alex knew that continuing to speak in English was her way of ensuring that Alex would understand what was being said, which comforted him that perhaps she was still on his side. Or maybe she was still conning him? "I was all set to sell compromising information to a buyer in North Korea, make it look like Israel was turning against its western allies. But on the morning when my operation was to take place, I was arrested Omar. Do you know why?"

Omar raised his eyebrows and said nothing.

"I was arrested for compromising information. The funny thing is, I had not yet stolen anything, and the stolen material was not on the computer of my intended target."

"I see," Omar said. His face gave nothing away.

"Do you know what _I _think, Omar?" Agent Shalom asked. "I think _you _stole the information, from the Director's computer himself, to make it all the worse, and set me up as part of some scheme for revenge."

Omar shrugged, not denying the claim.

"You had become an embarrassment," he said calmly.

Alex remembered that Yassen had said nearly exactly the same thing before killing Sayle. The coldness in his tone was exactly the same as Yassen's.

The gun was back in Agent Shalom's hand. These guards were well trained though, and their weapons were visible in seconds.

"By all means, attempt to kill me, _Yedit._"

"Oh I do not intend to kill you with anything less than my bare hands, _Yehudah,_" Agent Shalom snapped. Omar's face twisted into an ugly glare, matching Agent Shaloms. She put her gun down.

"Beshem Mishpachah*," she said quietly. "Beshem Shalom Baiyit*."

Omar hesitated, and then capitulated. He gestured for his guards to put their guns away.

"What information did you take?" Agent Shalom growled.

"I took nothing," Omar said. "I was only hired to set you up."

"You ruined my life for _money__?_" Agent Shalom demanded, eyes widening in disbelief and anger. "For who?"

"The thief was someone else in your agency," Omar continued. "This is all I know."

"Bullshit," Agent Shalom said. "Someone tries to pull off an operation to embarrass our father, and you get pulled into it, no way you don't know _exactly _what happened. I know how you operate."

_Our father... _Alex was unable to help himself.

"You're _siblings?"_

"Zahrah, who is this?" Omar asked lazily, looking at Alex for the first time.

"A friend from Mossad," Agent Shalom said without blinking. The lie was smooth, unthinking, and perfect. Alex would have believed it, and he had no doubts that it would have passed a lie detector test too. "He's my _handlers_ trainee. He's been helping me when I need to get off Mossad's grid for a few hours to do my night job."

"He's young," Omar observed.

"I'm in the room," Alex snapped. The corner of Omar's mouth turned up.

"Yes, we are siblings," Omar admitted to Alex. "The Director of Mossad had two affairs with the same Palestinian woman, so that his children would be half Arab, half Jewish, the perfect spies. He raised both of us to be moles in Hammas."

"And succeeded for a time with only one of us, and it wasn't me," Agent Shalom reminded her brother with a growl. "The information, please?"

"A flash drive I was given," Omar said. "I had a man go into the office, plug it in, and download all the files onto the drive. This is all I know."

"What about Dani's computer?" Agent Shalom asked. "It was compromised."

"The Director's computer was accessed through your handlers, which made you the perfect suspect, when Dani was obviously not guilty."

"Bastard," Agent Shalom said.

Omar said something in Arabic, and four of his guards advanced.

"What are you doing, Omar?" Agent Shalom asked. Alex didn't hear anything other than anger and wariness there, but he would have bet his last penny that she was as scared as he was.

"You believe that I would allow you to simply walk away, Yedit? I know where your allegiances are. I know where they have been for a long time. And your partner is not a Mossad trainee. He is British secret service, and he is in Gaza to help you clear your name."

_Where the bloody hell is their information coming from? _Alex wondered. He shouldn't have known that.

"What are you talking about Omar?" Agent Shalom asked. Her voice was bordering between control and panic, and the gun was back on her hand.

"You will not be allowed to leave," Omar said. "But _in the name of family_-" he paused, smirking – "I will not kill you. Some of my friends would very much love to get their hands on you, for ruining their operations, and would pay dearly for the chance to hear you scream before they eliminated you."

"Fuck you, _Yehudah_ Shalom."

"Ata Jahannam, Khawan*."

And then the guards jumped them.

Alex flung his bag into the face of one of the guards, kicking out with a roundhouse. Someone fired a gun, and he heard one of the guards cry out in pain – there was momentary relief that it wasn't Agent Shalom or him, and then he had to return his attention to the matter of surviving. If they could put that door between them and the terrorists for just a minute, they could –

Alex never finished the thought. Something hard hit him in the back of the head, and he fell forward like a light.

Instead, his final thought was a fervent wish that he had decided to take his chances with being tortured by some mysterious thug in London.

...

_*'Kavenah' means respect, usually referring to respect for god, but it also can mean respect for one's elders._

_*'Khawan' means traitor in Arabic._

_*'Yedit' is the feminine version of 'Yehudah'. They both refer to the name of the tribe of Israel that became rulers over the land in biblical days. Its Hebrew spelling is the closest to the name of god Jews are allowed to use. I figured it would be an extra slap in the face for them to have such names, because they have over the course of history become synonymous with the word 'Jew'._

_*The first phrase means 'in the name of family' and the second means 'in the name of peace in the home'._

_*It literally means 'go towards hell, traitor.' I am not sure this is grammatically correct in Arabic. If you know how to say titat properly, let me know? Thanks!_

_**Edited June 25 - fixed some transitions, sloppy grammar mistakes, the usual.**_


	8. A Spy At Heart

Operation: Red Crescent – A Spy At Heart

**Hey guys! Sorry for waiting so long to update – I know its been only a little over a week, but at least to me, it feels longer…**

**Just a quick note – I was shocked by the number of people who put this story on alert and added it to their favorites since I last updated. Thank you all! I hope you enjoy this next chapter of Operation: Red Crescent!**

******...**

"Is Agent Daniels certain?" Alan Blunt asked, finally looking away from the file in front of him and meeting the eyes of his deputy director.

"Yes," Mrs. Jones said. "We have to pull Alex out now. Its too dangerous."

"Alex can take care of himself," Blunt said. "He does have a perfect record."

"Mossad made contact yesterday morning! Alex had to attack an officer of the Israeli intelligence service in order to get them out."

"Good for Alex. It shows he was thinking on his feet."

"Is it your intention to create an international crisis?" Mrs. Jones demanded. "The director of Mossad is waiting for you to call him back regarding this incident. If you tell him Alex is acting on our orders, they will demand that we bring him back in. If you do not, Alex will be in much greater danger – you know what Mossad is like! They will shoot first and ask questions later."

"As you always say, I intend to deny everything."

Mrs. Jones stood angrily. "If Alex is killed-" she began, but Blunt cut her off.

"This past year would indicate that Alex has an amazing resilience to death," he said, clearly ending the conversation.

Mrs. Jones stormed out of the room with an incredulous look on her face, and Blunt turned on the computer monitor in his desk. When it lit up, he clicked the icon at the bottom to start up the chat window.

"Director Shalom," he said without preamble when the face of the director of Mossad peered out at him from the computer screen.

"Director Blunt, would you care to explain to me why an MI6 operative attacked one of my agents yesterday morning, allowing a known terrorist to evade capture?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Blunt said without blinking. "Perhaps you are mistaken?"

"Only a few months after I hear news that MI6 has a new operative, one of their most talented yet, a sixteen year old boy that is more weapon than child, one of my operatives reports being attacked by a British teenager," Director Shalom said, the accusation clear in his voice. "Agent Shalom was in Britain a little more than a week ago. I can connect the dots Alan."

There was a long silence on both ends. Finally, Blunt spoke.

"Bloody hell Shalom, are you accusing MI6 of using a _sixteen-year-old _as an operative?" he asked. "That breaks at least three British laws that I can think of off the top of my head. I don't know how things are done in Israel, but such an action would be intolerable in Britain."

"If I find out that you had anything to do with this-" Director Shalom threatened.

"You won't," Blunt said, and disconnected the chat.

_No_, he thought, _the director of Mossad never would find out whether or not Alex Rider was working for MI6._

"_Alex, could you take out the trash?"_

"_Sure Jack," Alex called down. He had been staring at the same page in his history textbook for twenty minutes, and he was pretty sure he had read the exact same sentence over and over. He gratefully pushed himself away from his desk, glad for excuse to take a break._

_Alex had already push the trash bag inside the black container outside when he heard the sound of footsteps behind him. Before he could turn, something heavy made contact with the back of his head…_

Alex woke to feel ice cold water being thrown over his head. He sputtered, spitting water and shaking his head. He shivered, and tried to wipe the water away from his eyes, but found that his hands were handcuffed behind him. He was laying on his side, and sitting up proved to be a challenge without his arms to provide balance.

He blinked, trying to restore his vision.

Where was he? Where was Jack?

Suddenly the last two weeks came rushing back and him, and Alex felt his head throb painfully. Alex was sure he had an impressive selection of bruises at the back of his head.

Someone grabbed Alex by the back of his shirt, dragging him to his feet, where balanced unsteadily, held up by two of Omar's men, the world swinging precariously for a moment. Alex only barely won the fight to keep himself from vomiting.

Then everything leveled out, and Alex was looking into the face of Omar Shalom.

"Can you understand me?" Omar asked. His voice sounded a little amused. Alex nodded.

"Good."

"Whesadit?" Alex asked. He heard the words slur in his mouth, and tried again.

"Where is Yedit?" he forced the words out slowly.

"My sister is enjoying the finest hospitality Hammas reserves just for traitors," Omar said. Alex shivered, partly from the freezing cold that clung to his now soaking clothing, party from the cruelty in Omar's voice.

"So what do you want with me?" Alex asked. He had a sinking feeling that he already knew the answer though.

"I want to know why the British government involved themselves in the trifling affair of a Mossad agent gone rouge," Omar said.

"Hell if I know," Alex muttered. He immediately regretted it when the air was driven out of his chest by a blow to his stomach. He doubled over in pain.

"I have little patience for childish sarcasm," Omar said calmly. "Why were you sent on this mission?"

_Deny everything, _the voice of Mrs. Jones whispered in his ear.

_Fuck you, _he told the little voice in his ear. Mrs. Jones and Alan Blunt had thrown him into this life that he had never wanted. Why the hell should he do anything for them? Why defend MI6 under the threat of torture? He'd die here, alone and bloody in the basement of some broken down hospital in Gaza (if that was even still where he was), without anything to show for it either way. MI6 had signed Alex's death warrant when they recruited him, and it was only a matter of time before Alex died, hurtling towards this inevitable end when he didn't even want to be working for them to begin with.

But was that really true?

Alex hated being used, but he couldn't imagine going back to living a normal life, not after everything that had happened to him. It wasn't a life he would have chosen for himself, but now…

Now it was in his blood, whether he liked it or not.

Anyway, likely as not, the scant information he did have was enough to condemn him. He had to stay alive long enough to figure out who had hired Omar, and where the flash drive had went.

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Alex said. "I don't know who you've been talking to, but I'm not British intelligence"

The blow came again, this time to the side of his face, knocking his head backwards. Alex tasted blood.

"I also have little patience for liars," Omar said.

"I told you, I-"

The next blow landed exactly where the first had, and Alex felt all the breath robbed from his lungs. He felt the two men behind him release him, shoving him down to the concrete floor. Unable to bring up his hands to protect himself, Alex landed hard on his shoulder.

"I want answers," Omar said, towering above him. Alex caught sight of a glint of steel in his hand, and tried to roll away from Omar, but the man placed a boot on his chest, stopping him from doing anything other than kicking out. "Now, I know you work for MI6. I want to know what they know and why you are here."

Omar motioned to his men, one of whom grabbed Alex's feet, and the other of whom held down his shoulders, effectively immobilizing him.

"One more time," Omar said. "Why did MI6 send someone to help my sister clear her name?"

Alex didn't say anything, but he couldn't prevent himself from crying out when Omar sliced through the skin of his cheek, drawing blood painfully.

The next stab of the knife cut through the skin of his shoulder, down to his stomach, tearing at the cloth of his T-shirt. Alex screamed.

There was no reason in it, nothing that he could achieve by vocalizing his pain, but he screamed anyway, the sound tearing from his throat like a wounded animal.

"Why are you here?" Omar asked. His voice was calm, quiet, and reasoned. Alex hated himself for being afraid, hated himself for capitulating even an inch of ground, but he just wanted it to end.

"MI6 wanted to make sure there were no other leaks in Mossad," he said. "They were afraid of this whole incident destabilizing the region."

"What was your mission?" Omar asked. Alex kept his mouth shut, but Omar raised the knife again, glinting red with his own blood, and Alex turned his head away, shutting his eyes.

"Find out who the real leak was, and recover the stolen information," he said.

"And did MI6 know who might have stolen it?"

"No."

MI6 _did _have a reasonable idea, thanks to Agent Shalom's hunches, that a terrorist cell was responsible for the theft, but Alex was not going to share that information. He hoped that wherever Agent Shalom was, she had a way of contacting MI6 – or even Mossad – so that they could get out of here. Fast.

Omar stood, flicking the knife closed. The two men stood up as well, releasing Alex to sit up.

Omar reached into his pocket and pulled out a bright purple flash drive.

"It just so happens that I have yet to deliver this to my employers," Omar said. Alex looked up at the drive, wanting so much to reach out and take it. It was the worst temptation he had ever had to endure in his life – if he wasn't handcuffed, he could have grabbed the flashrive then and there, but he was on the ground, helpless…

"But you won't get the chance to recover it anyway," Omar finished, putting the drive back in his pocket.

With that, he gave an order in Arabic to the two men, and all three walked out, leaving Alex bloodied and freezing on the floor of his cell.

_He had to get out._

Alex moved painfully, moving his cuffed hands around his legs so that they were in front of him. The pressure on his shoulders eased a bit, and having his hands in front was a little better than having them behind him.

He had to find that flashdrive, Alex knew. But it was more than that. He had to follow the drive, back to whoever had given it to Omar. That was the only way he was going to be able to clear Yedit's name.

Getting out was worthless if they just ended up in Mossad's clutches. Alex knew that Yedit would just be locked up as a terrorist. He know where he stood with Mossad, but after attacking Dani and helping a fugitive escape. While they tried to convince Mossad of what was going on, people would be killed.

No, they weren't quite done yet, Alex thought.

The world tilted worryingly as he tried to stand. The movement tugged at the cut across his stomach and caused Alex to gasp in pain, falling against the wall.

_If I don't do something about that, I'm going to bleed out, _Alex thought, leaning against the wall for support. The pain was less of a concern than the dizziness, for now.

Right now, the biggest issue was getting out. Alex cast around the room for the first time, looking for anything that might help him escape. The room was windowless, with only one steel door. No exit there, Alex thought. He had heard the lock click behind Omar and his cronies. The only other object in the room was a pail.

Alex looked up helplessly, and his eyes caught on the lightbulb.

_Worth a shot, _he thought.

Alex went over to the door and lay down so that he could look through the gap under the door. He didn't see anything except empty hallway. Listening hard, he couldn't hear anything either.

So he was alone.

Taking a running leap, Alex aimed to grab the light and pull it free from the ceiling. He missed and crashed painfully into the ground. The movement tore at the cut across his chest, and jostled his bruises painfully. He cried out despite his determination to stay silent.

Alex groaned.

_One more time, _he told himself, pushing himself up to his feet again.

Alex glared up at the light. He backed up for another jump.

This time, he managed to grab the bulb and pull it from the ceiling, the chain trailing behind it. When the chain came free, and the cable connecting it to the ceiling snapped, Alex was thrown into darkness. He stumbled and fell to the ground again, keeping his hand tightly closed around his one desperate hope.

He waited for a few minutes in the dark, wondering if anyone would notice the commotion. When no one did, and his eyes had adjusted to the dark room – a shaft of light from underneath the door gave him some light to work by – Alex turned his attention back to the business of getting out.

Alex smashed the light on the ground. Splintered glass shot everywhere in the darkness, and Alex turned his face away in case any shards went up. He looked back down at the broken bulb, the metal circuit inside fully exposed.

He pulled the metal prongs free, bending one of them into a careful 's' shape. It took his another minute of working with the delicate metal rods, but he managed to get his hands free of the handcuffs. They clattered to the ground, discarded.

Now all he had to do was get out.

Alex considered that question for a moment, sitting cross-legged on the floor, surrounded by broken glass. There was no one outside, which meant that he couldn't trick anyone into opening the door. His best chance was picking the lock. He stood and moved over to the door. It took him considerably longer than the simple catch on the handcuffs, but he heard the click of the lock, and he felt his heart skip a beat.

He was out. Alex sent back to grab one of the larger shards of glass before moving out into the hall. The light burned his eyes, and he waited for a minute before moving on.

While he waited for his eyes to adjust, Alex wondered what his course of action should be. He could go after Yedit, and risk Omar handing the drive over while he fumbled around looking, or he could go for the drive, and risk Yedit.

And if he found the drive, he wouldn't be able to go find Yedit later. He would have to stay with it, and see who Omar gave it to, and follow them if it was necessary, to get to the bottom of this.

Omar wouldn't kill her yet, Alex reasoned. He had more time to find Yedit than to find that flash drive. And she could take care of herself. She was a trained Mossad agent, after all. She had run more missions than he had, and had successfully convinced Hammas of her loyalty for years while she betrayed them. She would be fine. And even if she wasn't…

_There are some things that are worth dying for, _she had told Alex. If it came to that, he knew where she stood at least. Yedit would not thank him for putting peoples lives at risk to save her.

_Yedit is not going to die, _Alex told himself, setting off again. He would follow the drive, and contact someone as soon as he could to tell them where Yedit was.

Was Yedit even in the same building anymore? Was Alex? They could be a world apart already.

Alex refused to think about that.

Even so, he felt very guilty as he started off down the hallway. When it came down to it, he was leaving Agent Shalom on her own no matter how well he rationalized his actions.

_Well, its not like that's anything new, for either of us, _he thought bitterly. _We're spies, both of us, right down to the bone._

With that cheering thought, Alex plunged into the unknown.

...

**Edited November 6, 2012**


	9. Luck of the Devil

Operation: Red Crescent – Luck of the Devil

**Hello all! Okay, so here's the thing: I have to take my SAT's and two AP history exams within the next couple of weeks. So you won't see much of me for a while. To make up for that, I'm writing to all a long, action packed chapter to make up for it.**

**So just consider this my advance apology for abandoning you guys for a while, okay?**

**The story about Dani… is about my MME teacher. The best way for me to describe this man is with a Terry Pratchet quote: "He was the kind of man that stood on a hill during a thunderstorm, wearing wet copper armor, shouting that all the gods are bastards."**

A QUICK WORD: Israel has neither confirmed nor denied the existence of nuclear weapons. They certainly work with nuclear power, but considering how many major Arab nations either have nuclear weapons, or are working on it, you can bet Israel has a good team of people working on getting nukes if they don't have any already. Anyway, for the purpose of this fic, I assume they do have hidden nukes. Honestly, I have no clue. Its pure bullshit on my part. But hey, its fanfiction! =)

**Anyway, you all know the drill by now. I do not own Alex Rider. **

Agent Shalom was bleeding. She had tried to stem the flow of blood with her hajib, but there was nothing she could do. There simply wasn't enough cloth for her to stop herself from bleeding out.

_If I don't get help, I'm going to die, _she thought.

And as resourceful as Alex was, there was no way he was getting them both out of this.

Looking down at her bleeding limbs, she realized that she wasn't very likely to be leaving. She would be absolutely useless in an escape attempt, and it would be a waste of time for Alex to try and save her.

They had failed.

Omar had probably already sold the drive, and given away the top-secret information he had stolen. But what if he hadn't?

Agent Shalom now knew what was on the flashdrive. Omar had told her exactly what he had stolen when he had told her how he had stolen it.

The only reason someone would need to access her father's computer files was to steal major defense secrets. Secrets like Israel's nuclear missiles.

Israel was one of the few western nations that had failed to sign on to the NPT – the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (not that it really mattered considering Iran had managed to develop a healthy nuclear program even though it had signed on to the treaty, Agent Shalom thought). It's nuclear weapons were some of the best-kept secrets in the world.

If Iran was behind the theft… Agent Shalom shivered. Israel would be wiped off the map within a matter of days. The center of Jewish culture and faith, gone. The one place her people had clung to after the destruction of the holocaust would be obliterated, leaving a radioactive crater.

Agent Shalom remembered a story Dani had told her about his younger days. He had been in college in the United States, going for a law degree. When the first Gulf War had broken out, he abandoned law school and moved to Israel, serving in the army. When his tour ended, he settled down in Jerusalem and started a gallery of old Zionist posters.

One Monday morning, he had been running late to work. His car had broken down, and he was supposed to take the number 18 bus. He had forgotten something at home and had to run back from the bus stop. He missed the bus, but it had turned out for the best – halfway down its route, the bus exploded.

The next week, his wife had convinced him to take the day off, still scared by the incident. Again, the number 18 bus exploded, the same one Dani should have gotten on.

The next Monday, he made a point to take the number 18 bus to work.

Three days later, he signed up for Mossad.

Agent Shalom knew she had to stop the impending destruction, ad she knew she only had once choice now.

If there was any chance Omar had not sold the drive yet, she had to make sure that it would stay on the grounds of the hospital. No matter that they would never find out who was behind the theft, the only thing that mattered now was neutralizing the threat that that flash drive posed to her people. Even if that meant that she had to take the fall for the theft. Better for her to be thought a traitor than for millions of Jews – and Arabs – to die needlessly.

Shifting painfully, Agent Shalom managed to get her bound hands around to her front. She lifted up her shirt, revealing a golden belly-button ring. She pressed the tiny emerald on the top, and sat back, letting her T-shirt drop back down.

Mossad would be coming for her soon. Agent Shalom could only pray that they would find Omar before they found her.

It wasn't exactly on purpose when she opened her mouth to pray. Agent Shalom had only once before uttered the Shema under fear of her own death. She had been eighteen, imprisoned by Mossad, and the only thing she had thought at that moment was that she was going to die and go to hell.

When the ancient prayer left her lips now, Agent Shalom knew with a finalistic certainly that this was her final mission.

And she also knew that she wanted to die like thousands of other heroes and martyrs had died for her country and her god – with the ancient prayer of her people on her lips, an absolute and unquestioning declaration of her faith.

"Shema, Yistorel, Adonai Eloheinu, Adonai Echad," she whispered. "Barcuh shem…"

_Hear, O Israel, our God is Hashem, our God is one. Blessed be His name…._

* * *

Alex stumbled along the corridor, not seeing anyone. From the pipes that ran along the ceiling, he decided he was still in the hospital, somewhere deep underground. He had to find Omar and that flash drive, and fast.

He was shirtless. The knife had cut through his T-shirt, leaving nothing more than scraps left. It was doing more harm than good, but it was bloody cold down in the basement of the hospital. Alex forced his mind back to the task at hand, not letting himself think of his physical discomfort.

If Omar was anywhere, Alex reasoned, he would be upstairs. He found a stairwell and started climbing. Every step pulled at his bruises and cuts, and he found himself swearing silently as he went. Yedit had augmented his knowledge of English swearwords with a vast vocabulary of Hebrew and Arabic swears, very few of which he could understand, but all of which were very satisfying.

A thought occurred to him as he climbed. Would Ben be able to help them? He somehow doubted it. As far as Ben knew, they were deep undercover.

"_One guy with a gun really tips the balance against a couple score guys with improvised explosives and AK-47's," _Alex had said back in Blunt's office.

Somehow, he thought that one guy might make a big difference right now.

Or even a gun might help.

Alex was dripping in sweat by the time he made it up one flight. He wondered if he should keep going, or search this floor too.

_This place is bloody huge! _Alex thought with some dismay. Back in his cell, he had assumed that everything would much easier – to a certain extent, he was relying on the blind luck that had saved his life at least once a day since he had first been recruited by MI6.

The sound of voices decided it for him. Alex pushed open the door to the stairwell, moving out onto the floor above the one where he had been imprisoned. The shard of glass from the light felt like a very inadequate weapon against machine guns and rifles.

The sound of voices was clearer here, echoing down the corridor. Alex moved in their direction, tensing himself for a fight.

There were two of them, speaking in rapid Arabic. Alex couldn't make out any single words that he understood, but even so, he was reasonably sure he was going the right way.

One of those voices belonged to Omar.

Alex snuck down the hall, trying to make his movements as soundless as possible.

One of the doors was partially open, and orange light was flooding through, contrasting with the dingy fluorescent lights that ran along the ceiling. The voices were coming from inside.

Alex paused by the door, needing to take a breather, terrified of the sound of his lungs or heart being heard.

A third voice spoke, but it wasn't in Arabic.

He was speaking in Russian, and Alex knew that voice even better than he knew Omar's.

_No, _he told himself. _There was no way in hell you're hearing right._

Alex risked a glance through the crack in the door over the hinges, his mind refusing to believe the testimony of his ears.

Omar was sitting at a table, with his back to Alex. There were two men across from him, one looked Middle Eastern, though somehow not quite Arab, and the other man was Russian, blonde, and impassive.

If blood could curdle, Alex was sure his would have at the sight of the assassin.

Yessen Gregorovitch said something again, his voice razor sharp,and the Arab man started to translate.

_Why don't they both just speak English? _Alex wondered. He wanted to know what was going on.

"Enough of this," Yassen growled when his translator was halfway through a sentence. "You were given a price, which you accepted. You will take the amount you accepted and walk away. As I understand it, your income was already supplemented by the happy surprise of being able to sell your sister anyway."

Omar said something that did not sound flattering, but he seemed to relent. Yassen placed a silver case on the table, and unhooked it, showing Omar the money inside.

Alex stared. Inside that box was more money than he had ever seen in his life. Stack upon stack of hundred-dollar bills, all placed neatly together.

_There's no way Yassen planned all of this on his own, _Alex thought. The assassin was working with Scorpia, or someone. There was no way he would go this far for one target.

_The dead assassin, _Alex thought to himself, unsettled. He had _seen _the man die! There was no way he could have survived. Yassen _died in his arms. _Unless he was some kind of zombie…

"The drive?" the zombie asked, putting out his hand.

Omar handed over the purple flash drive.

It was very unfortunate that Alex chose that moment to shift his motion to better see through the crack. His leg ever so slightly moved the door, closing it a fraction of an inch.

It was much more unfortunate that Yassen had looked up at exactly that second.

Alex saw the assassin stiffen, like a dog catching the scent of an intruder, and backed away from the door, holding his pitiful shard of glass.

The door slammed open with impressive force. Alex jumped the first person he could reach, stabbing for all he was worth. He heard a gun go off, shouts in Arabic, and then he was slammed against the wall, all the breath knocked out of him. He had released his weapon, still in the back of the man he had attacked. He felt a dull sting in his hand, and realized he was bleeding where the broken glass had cut into him.

Someone kicked him vicious before he could get a good grip on exactly where he was. For a moment, Alex couldn't think for the pain that exploded in his chest.

There was the sound of gunfire, and Alex expected to be dead, but he was still breathing. Slowly, his breath evened out. He looked up, and saw Omar and Yassen considering him.

The man he had attacked – the interpreter, was lying dead next to him.

Alex was paralyzed. He stared into the eyes of the terrorist and the dead man, his mind utterly blank.

"You're dead," he finally said, his gaze landing on Yassen.

"Clearly," the zombie assassin said.

"You know this boy?" Omar asked.

"We've met," Yassen said dryly.

"You're a real bastard, you know that?" Alex asked.

"Little Alex, my job involves me being a bastard," Yassen said, sounding amused.

"As for this transaction…" Yassen glanced at Omar. As he looked away, Alex looked over at the dead man, trying to avoid having to look at the two killers. _His gun was still in his hand._ "I believe my employers will want to question him, to see how much he knows."

"He knows nothing," Omar spat.

"This is a very… delicate… operation, and I am sure our mutual friends would be very happy to have their minds put to rest on the issue," Yassen said firmly.

Alex moved faster than even he could have believed, reaching over and grabbing the gun while the two men were distracted. He moved a few steps away, just making it to his feet.

Omar's gun was pointed at Alex at once, but Yassen looked almost bored.

"Put down the gun little Alex," he said.

"Give me the flash drive," Alex answered.

"You don't even know what's on it," Yassen said, amused.

"I don't have to know how you came back from the dead to know that you're a murdering psychopath, but there you go," Alex answered. He heard arriving steps, and realized the yelling he had heard earlier had been calls for reinforcements.

"Put down the gun and come with me Alex," Yassen ordered.  
"Hell bloody no."

And then someone else was shouting behind them.

"Mossad! Tasim et hayadaim lemalah!"

Alex recognized the Hebrew from the corridor behind him. Yassen's eyes flickered beyond Alex's shoulder.

"Alex," Yassen said warningly.

Alex opened his mouth to tell Yassen to give him the flash drive when the shot was fired, echoing through the corridor.

Alex wasn't quite sure how he could still feel pain. He wasn't sure why he was still able to process everything that hurt him.

The bullet felt like a searing brand, burying itself in his back.

It tore through Alex, and he stumbled forward, falling to the floor, unable to even raise his hands in defense. His body seemed to have given up on him entirely, and had stopped obeying his commands. He heard shouting, yells, but somehow all of that was irrelevant. His whole body _hurt _everywhere, and there was a burning pain in his side, where he supposed the bullet must have entered his body.

He was unable to resist as someone pulled him back on his feet, and was dragging him backwards.

The world faded in and out of focus. One moment, he was in the stairwell, and the next he was out on the street. He was being dragged forcibly by someone; he was pretty sure it was Yassen, but he was beyond caring anymore.

He was loaded into the back of an ambulance, which didn't make any sense. The red crescent on the side of the ambulance filled his vision even when he was inside, jumping in front of his eyes. Someone was talking to him, but he couldn't hear them, didn't care. Couldn't they just leave him alone?

And then he was fading, and there was a comfortable blanket of nothingness enveloping him. The last thing he heard before he surrendered was the sound of a monitor flatlining.

Alex Rider was dead.


	10. Heartbeat

Operation: Red Crescent – Heartbeat

**Okay. Honestly, I **_**was **_**going to wait a week to write this up. I was going to let you guys think I had left it at that tiny little chapter with Alex dying.**

**I couldn't do it. One, I'm not mean enough by a long shot, and two, I had to finish the damn story now. **

**I meant to give you some suspense. I meant to space it out. But I gave up on my Middle East review project because I couldn't take it anymore. I had to write this. **

**Yes, I know that both this and the last chapter were very short. So consider them each one chapter, making today's adventure add up to one who, substantial chapter, okay?**

**Please read the AN at the bottom before you jump me for my existential/psychological incompetence.**

**Clearly, I am still not AH. **

Alex floated for what felt a long time in the darkness.

It could have been an eternity, or it could have been only a few seconds. He couldn't hear anything, couldn't see anything, and best of all, he couldn't _feel. _Couldn't feel the anger he felt towards MI6, the pain that had been pounding every inch of his body for days now, or the desperate despair at the knowledge that he would never see Jack again.

He was no longer Alex Rider, but some blank consciousness, cleansed, renewed.

Nirvana. Heaven. Or as close to heaven as the not-quite-Alex consciousness had ever imagined.

He was flying through the soundless, thoughtless, emotionless darkness, soaring. It was a wonderful, freeing feeling.

There was something fuzzy at the back of his mind, people talking, whispering, like ghosts. He could hear only some of what they said, as if he was wearing thick ear mufflers, and they were speaking deliberately quietly. He knew they were there, though.

He wondered if they were other dead people, and in a manner that was very much like Alex, he tried very hard to understand what they were saying, to glean some clue as to what they were.

A thought that was very not-Alex-like crossed his mind then. He had left his history book on the table back at home. Jack, who would have been waiting for him – he had just stepped out for a second to put out the trash, when MI6 had grabbed him – and he could see the page floating in front of him. Something about the de-colonization of Africa, and the re-nationalization of the Suez canal for Egypt.

It had slipped through his mind then, but now it seemed terribly important. Such a stupid, trivial thing, yet it drew the not-Alex consciousness towards that page, as if there was something very important hidden in those pages.

There was a picture, in black and white, of military leaders in formation, cheering around the Egyptian president, who had defeated invading forces of France, Britain… and another much newer country, he remembered… But the Egyptian president stirred up nationalism in a French colony, and forced them to divide their resources with a bloody civil war in Algeria… And the grinning face of Gamal Nasser above the jubilant thrones... But the picture changed, showing him a pristine Egyptian coastline, colored like a recent photophraph.

"_Hammas, they are experts at making things seem as they are not, and making things that are not seem as if they are," _Agent Shalom was saying next to him.

He was standing on the boat, but when he turned to look, the figure speaking to him wasn't Agent Shalom anymore, it was Smithers, and he had a hand extended. There was a pack of strawberry bubblegum in his hand.

"_As I remember, you said this came in handy last time,"_ Smithers said. And then Alex was staring at that page again, floating in front of him. He tried to ignore it, wanting to go back into darkness, to go back to being not-Alex in a personal heaven of Nirvana. It had been so peaceful, so quiet.

"_You didn't tell me what was on that flash drive. You aren't getting it until you double your offer."_

_Alex was back in the hall, peering through a crack at Omar, Yassen, and the interpreter. They were speaking in english, though the inflections sounded exactly the same as they had before. _

"_I am sorry to hear that. My… friends would very much regret to hear that you had gone back on our bargain."_

"_We're talking about-"_

_Alex could have screamed in frustration when the voice switched back to Arabic._

The memory faded, though the one word in Arabic stood out in his mind. He couldn't remember why it was so important, but he knew that it was…

The page remained insistently at the forefront of his thought. Grumbling, knowing he needed to solve this riddle to return to the enveloping darkness, he looked very hard, searching for a clue, but the second he tried to see it, the writing on the page ran.

_What else had been on the page?_

A whole two pages on the conflict in the Middle East, and some of its colonial history, Alex thought. He forced himself to focus. It was at the bottom of the left hand column on the right page, near the binding.

But even as he tried to keep track of it, the image fell apart before his eyes, and Alex cried out frustrated, as he fell back into darkness. But this time, he felt finality in the darkness. He had failed, and now it was over. There was brief disappointment, anger, frustration, and then, remarkably, relief.

The warm, soundless peace that rolled around him again, and Alex was once again that not-Alex, blank consciousness. He drew the darkness around him, and let himself slide back into that nirvana.

_* * *_

A sound. At first it was so quiet, Alex couldn't hear it. But it grew more and more insistent at the back of his mind. _Thump. _Every few seconds, perhaps ten, or twelve, though it could have been an eternity, for all he knew. Time didn't seem to matter.

_Thump._

Why couldn't that sound just go away and leave him alone? Why, like MI6, did it insist on torturing him?

The picture returned, taunting him like that damn sound…

_The British and the French, along with the Israelis invaded Egypt. This, however, was the dying grasp of the imperial order… the moralistic Americans joined with the Soviets to force the British, French, and Israeli troops to withdraw…_

But no… It wasn't something specifically on that page. His history teacher had gone off on a tangent that day, when he had gotten to the fight over the Suez Canal, which had originally been in the hands of the British, which had controlled Egypt as a colonial holding until 1922 and remained staunchly under its influence for the century thereafter.

_Thump. _

Very much like Egypt, Iran, had remained under British influence, his teacher had said. They controlled Iran because they wanted the oil, and they instituted a puppet regime…

_Thump._

Alex wished the sound would stop, it was making it difficult to concentrate. It was like trying to see down to the bottom of a lake when something kept ripping the water.

_Project Ajax… _Alex didn't know where that name came from. He tried to force himself to recall, as he had never been able to before, a history lesson.

Officially, it was an American operation. The head of MI6 at the time had been very conspicuously getting himself incredibly trashed for ten days straight while the Americans unseated the president of Iran, who had won a popular election. Even so, the British took an equal share in the blame that the Americans got. They had unseated the president because…

_Thump. Thump._

Damn that bloody sound!

…because he had been throwing around 'buzzwords' that made him sound communist, and the Americans, fully in the grips of the fear of Russia spreading communism, had taken out the president and reinstated the Shah, who the people hated, because he was too liberal and basically a puppet…

Alex was struggling to bring all the pieces together. Something that would tie his current mission with a government coup in 1953, and strawberry bubblegum, and… beaches…

_Thump, thump._

A jolt shocked through Alex's body, making him feel every cell of his skin, burning in agony. He screamed – he couldn't control it, couldn't help it – he screamed like a child, without control.

_Thu-thu-thu-Thump, Thump, Thump. _The sound was growing louder and more irritating as the pain died away. Alex forced himself to concentrate. This was crucial. But even as he tried to focus, he was distracted by the realization of what the sound was.

His own sluggish heartbeat. He felt frustration and annoyance again. Why did he have to be alive? Why couldn't he just fucking _die _already?

Why couldn't he be dead? What on earth could he possibly have done to deserve being dragged out of his heaven, his quiet, peaceful heaven? What deity had he managed to offend God so badly that he was being forced to live through circumstances that would kill anyone else?

The sound faltered, leaving him with silence for a time.

When consciousness surfaced again, Alex was staring at a pack of strawberry bubblegum, which warned him of its 'explosive' flavor.

He had used the strawberry bubblegum… to escape the handcuffs that had held him within the blast radius of a bomb that would ignite nuclear waste onboard a bunch of old soviet submarines.

Unsure what that had to do with anything, Alex lay that clue aside.

Project Ajax had only come to mind Yedit had been accused of selling the Iranians information… But what if it was something more? Someone who had gotten screwed when the operation had been implemented…

Another painful jolt of electricity making his whole body aware of the pain that reached to the very ends of his fingers and toes, and he took a gasping breath.

_Thu-thump. Thu-Thump. Thu-Thump._

He was on the very edge of consciousness, hearing voices yelling, dark shapes moving. A vaguely familiar face appeared in his line of sight, but he couldn't place it.

Alex shut his eyes. This was important, and he was so close, the answer was staring him in the face, taunting him now.

…someone who had gotten blamed unreasonably for the fiasco of Project Ajax. Someone who would suffer from a militant, powerful, nuclear Iran.

Even in the darkness of semi-consciousness, Alex felt cold.

Britain.

MI6 had sold nuclear secrets to Iran?

_Thu-thump. Thu-thump._

They had set up Yedit and sent him on this wild goose chase.

And they had tried to send him to hell with her.

He rolled over and vomited, shaking uncontrollably.

He felt the sound of his traitor heart, pumping blood once again. Its resolute pounding seemed to cry out its own betrayal, keeping him alive again his will: _Kha-wan. Kha-wan. Kha-wan._

_So where did Yassen fit in?_

No, there was no way. It hadn't been MI6. Alex wasn't sure if it was his own refusal to believe that his own country that was capable of such a betrayal, but there was something more. He _knew _that MI6 hadn't organized this.

Aside from Yassen's presence, as far as Alex could tell, this wasn't really Blunt's style. It was too risky. There were too many unknown factors, too few things he could control. Mrs. Jones would never have okayed a mission like this either.

Whoever _was _responsible was someone that wanted to make MI6 _look _like they had stolen nuclear secrets.

Someone had essentially stolen Israeli nuclear weapons, and blamed Britain.

Someone was trying to set up an international disaster.

Someone was targeting Israel, and Britain would take the blame.

_Where the hell is Yedit? _Alex thought desperately.

And then the darkness took him again.

The sound of treachery accompanied him into unconsciousness.

_Kha-wan. Kha-wan. Kha-wan._

_* * *_

**AN: Hi, just a quick note. Before you all call bullshit on the way that Alex figured all of this out, lets be fair – he did hear **_**exactly **_**what Omar and Yassen were talking about. Yedit **_**did **_**give him a certain amount of training in Arabic. They were talking to fast for him to get everything, but I'm 90% sure on a list of Agent Shalom's favorite buzzwords she would teach a newbie… 'nuclear' probably would make the top three. In every dialect. I'm assuming Alex fabricated the entire conversation, other than that, based on whatever logic his essentially dead brain came up with.**

**Oh, and I'm going to go ahead and just say that the voices at the beginning were part of the reason Alex started thinking of the open textbook. That whole thing didn't just come out of nowhere. **

**Also, I am **_**by no means**_** suggesting that barely avoiding death will help you solve that impossible AP Chemistry problem. Just saying.**

**On another note, does anyone notice how trippy the inside of Alex's head is? **


	11. Questions and Answers

Operation: Red Crescent – Questions and Answers

**This is my present to all of you for being such awesome and patient readers. I have an AP European History exam tomorrow, and I needed a break, so I finished this. I do honestly care why Metternich of Austria wanted Greece to be independent, but I decided to place my creative energies with Alex Rider instead. **

**I won't be able to write again until the weekend after this, so please give me a little leeway – I have another AP History exam at the end of next week.**

**So life sucks, a lot, right now. **

**Wish me luck, and I hope you enjoy this next chapter – its long, informative, and probably very boring, for which I apologize. I'll get some action in next time, I promise!**

**As usual, I don't own AR. Not in real life anyway… **

Alex drifted in an out of consciousness several times, opening his eyes to a blurry, indistinct world. Each time it was only for short intervals in which he could see the world whirring sickeningly around him, threatening to make him vomit.

When he finally opened his eyes for good, the first thing he noticed was that he hurt all over. There was literally no part of his body that wasn't in pain.

The second was that he was in what looked like a hospital room. His arms and legs were held down in leather restraints. The room was clinical and white, featureless except for the incessant beeping of the monitor beside him, proclaiming his vital heartbeat and the heavy machinery that went along with hospital rooms.

Alex took a moment to inventory how badly he had ended off. His side burned where he had been shot, and his whole body was covered in multi-colored bruises. Movement was painful. The cut across his chest was heavily bandaged, and Alex had a splitting headache. All in all, he had been better off, Alex decided, but he had also definitely seen worse. The cut was painful, but shallow, and the bruises were already fading. He remembered how pissed he had been just a day ago – or was it? Alex didn't know how long he had been out of it – waking up in a cave full of terrorists. Alex could have laughed at himself for thinking that was going to be the worst he would see on this little jaunt.

The whining, childish part of his brain wanted him to give up. He had run his race and lost. It was bound to happen someday. What could he do? Yassen clearly had the flash drive, and would have sold it by now. A nuclear disaster was imminent, ready to strike at any second. His partner was somewhere unknown, either captive to a group of sadistic terrorists bent on revenge, or hunted by her own people. And he was helpless to stop it.

The spy in him was unwilling to accept that reality. Alex had never been one to accept being helpless, and as bleak as this situation seemed, he had to find a way to salvage it.

Alex had one priority now – finding the flash drive. If his life depended on it, he had to deliver it back to Mossad, unmolested.

His personal health meant nothing. Not compared to what was coming if he failed – it would be World War Three, fought over the Middle East, a fully nuclear conflict.

The door opened, cutting through the end of Alex's decision.

"You're alive," Yassen said, snapping the door closed behind him. There was surprise, and not a little approval in the words.

"Unfortunately," Alex spat.

"Your heart stopped twice," Yassen said. "The second time, when I got your heart pumping again, thanks to your friend, you had lost so much blood, I wondered if you would ever be able to come back."

"How long have I been out?" Alex asked.

"A week, give or take," Yassen said casually, leaning against the door.

_A week?!_

Alex felt the certainty and determination drain from his body. A week? That was it then, he thought. Game over.

"Why am I alive?" he demanded bitterly.

"My employers want to ensure that this deal has not been compromised," Yassen explained. "As such, they have withheld the flash drive until such time as they have been assured that you know nothing of importance."

"Letting me die would let anything I knew die with me," Alex pointed out, trying to hide the elation he was feeling at the knowledge that all was not quite lost. Probably, it wasn't the best thing to say to someone who made killing his business, but he figured Yassen had plenty of chances to let him die.

"Why are you alive?" He asked, taking his mind off the subject. But Yassen decided to argue the point, and ignore his question entirely.

"Then Scorpia would never know who you had contacted," Yassen countered. "Whether or not your partner, who escaped her brother's clutches, knows anything…"

Alex froze. Yedit was free? He felt a surge of relief, and hope.

"Don't expect that Miss Shalom will be able to help you, little Alex," Yassen said, seeing the expression on Alex's face and guessing at where his thoughts are going. "She will not be able to find you, and she is already dodging the best agents Mossad has, with the intent of eliminating her."

"So what is this now – resistance is futile and all that?" Alex asked, trying for bravado. "I would have thought that you'd at least be able to keep away from all the cliché crap."

Yassen didn't even react to Alex's baiting. He shrugged.

"Do you know what is on the flash drive you were sent to retrieve?" he asked.

"No," Alex said, but the increased frequency of the beeping behind him gave the lie away as easily as if he had spelled it out himself. Yassen smirked.

"Who have you told?"

"MI6 knows everything," he said.

"I think…" Yassen said with a frown, moving toward Alex purposefully, "…not. The question, however, is exactly how much they do know."

Alex flinched, looking down. Damn! He was strapped to a freaking lie detector, pretty much. There was no way he could bluff his way out.

He closed his mouth obstinately. Let Yassen think the worst – he would be obliged to. Let Yassen think MI6 had enough information to bring his whole operation crashing down around Scorpia's ears.

"I wonder what the board of Scorpia would do if I presented you to them so that they could extract their revenge," Yassen said thoughtfully. "Levi Kroll is heading this particular operation. His work is nothing short of legendary among Scopria operatives. He might let Dr. Three finish you off though – Three has always received a great deal of pleasure from the suffering of others."

Alex knew that Yassen was just trying to fuck with his head, trying to freak him out. He tried not to listen, he really did. But he was transfixed by the assassins words, rooted, horrified, to his narration.

"They would exploit your already existing weaknesses," Yassen said. He closed the gap between himself and Alex with a step, and pressed down, _hard _on the new gunshot wound Alex had collected.

The world went black for a minute. Pain was the only thing that existed. A universe of dark agony felt like the only thing he had ever known –

The pain receded, and Alex came back, covered in sweat and shaking.

"You might even manage to curse at Three, or Kroll, after catching your breath," Yassen continued. "But slowly, they would break you…"

His hand moved threateningly towards the knife wound that crossed the teenage spy's chest. Alex tried to avoid him, tried to escape it, but it was hopeless. Yassen only smirked, and drew his hand back. Alex was breathing as if he had just been running very far, the heartbeat on the monitor speeding up.

"They would watch you writhe for the pure joy of it, not caring how loudly you spilled your guts, how many national secrets and confidences you betrayed."

Yassen's voice was still cold, clinical.

"And then, when they had finished, they would leave you to die, screaming, shivering, covered in a mess of your own blood, crying like the child you are," he finished casually.

Alex closed his lips resolutely. He could not let Yassen's mind games screw with his head.

"Either way, you hand me over," Alex snapped, unable to help himself from arguing. "What does it matter if I give you what you want or not? I'm just as dead one way or the other."

"Wrong, Alex," Yassen said, amused. "If you tell me what I need to know, and cooperate, you can walk out of here on your own two feet. You do not need to experience the torture that Scorpia can bring to bear."

"Fuck you," Alex said.

The pain stabbed at his side, blanking his vision, making him cry out in pain. This time, it was relatively quick.

"I do not enjoy being cursed at," Yassen said coolly.

Alex glared back at Yassen.

"You're a hypocrite, you know that?" he rasped. Yassen raised his eyebrows.

"I never figured a guy who would get shot before killing a kid would have no problem torturing a teenager," Alex spat at him.

"I would much prefer it I didn't have to," Yassen said. "In attempting to foil my transaction, you messed up this entire operation. I get the happy job of cleaning house."

Alex snorted.

"So 'this hurts me more than it hurts you'?" he asked derisively. "Nice."

"You aren't a patriot," Yassen said. "Why do this? Why endure all this pain?"  
"To spite you," Alex said. He was rewarded with another blinding stab of pain when Yassen pressed down on the bullet wound again.

"Scorpia killed my dad, okay?" Alex yelled, fed up with Yassen, with this whole situation. If he could distract Yassen long enough, he might be able to get out.

He didn't expect Yassen to pause, confused. His features rearranged into a look of understanding, after a moment, however, and he held his ground.

"Scorpia didn't kill John," he said with quiet certainty. "MI6 shot him on Albert Bridge."

"No they didn't," Alex answered, jutting out his chin proudly. "He was working for MI6 all the time – he faked his death on Albert Bridge so that he could go back to them. He wanted out of everything, and he was going to France with my mum when a Scopria agent planted a bomb on their plane."

Yassen visibly flinched.

"Are you sure?"

"Absolutely."

Alex met Yassen's stare, and to his surprise, it was the assassin who looked away first.

Yassen slammed the door behind him on his was out. Anyone might believe that the killer was actually upset. Alex watched the door close, surprised – he was relatively certain he had just seen as close as Yassen had ever gotten to running away from someone.

Levi Kroll was at his desk, looking over the contents of a bulky file when Yassen walked in.

"Gregorovitch," Kroll said coolly. "Have you determined what threat the boy poses to this operation?"

"He is proving… resistant," Yassen said. A lesser man might have quailed under Kroll's piercing glare.

"You made this mess, Gregorovitch," he said icily. "Do I need to remind you of the consequences of failing to clean it up?"

"Funny," Yassen snapped. In his anger, he reverted back to his native Russian, but Kroll was able to follow him just as easily as if he had been speaking English still. "Because Scorpia seems to be becoming sloppier and sloppier cleaning up after themselves."

Kroll watched Yassen calmly. When he spoke, his voice was razor sharp. "Explain, please."

"Who ordered the hit on John Rider?" Yassen demanded.

"Why ask now, fourteen years after the fact?" Kroll asked.

"What does it matter?" Yassen asked. "Who ordered the hit?"

"Alan Blunt did," Kroll said calmly. "He was killed on Albert Bridge. You were there, I believe, as backup?"

"Is there any reason Alex would think that his father was an MI6 operative, undercover in Scopria, and had been killed by a bomb set on a plane he and his wife were on?"

"MI6 has lied to the boy through their teeth, Gregorovitch," Kroll said. "It is little wonder he blames Scorpia. However, I know exactly who _I _should blame if we cannot resume this operation within twenty-four hours. Fix it, Gregorovitch."

Yassen knew a dismissal when he saw it. He wanted to argue the point, wanted to strangle the truth out of the man in front of him, but that happy fantasy was going to have to remain in his head.

"May I make a suggestion?" he asked. Kroll looked up, annoyed, but he didn't stop Yassen from continuing.

"Torturing Alex will only alienate him," the Russian said carefully. "MI6 has used and abused him many times, and I do not think his allegiance to them is more than superficial. It will not be a difficult thing to break. If we offer him the respect MI6 will not give him, he will defect."

"He has already proved his willingness to betray Scorpia once," Kroll said. But Yassen was already shaking his head.

"Had Alex done nothing, he would have died as well," he said. "Rothman attempted to use him and manipulate him in the same way MI6 had. It was little wonder that he went running back to them. He would be a valuable asset, Levi."

Kroll considered it. Aside from the pleasure being able to corrupt MI6's golden boy, he could see how having such a young and experience operative could be infinitely useful.

"And of the problem of Alex not being able to shoot live targets?" he asked, already committing to the decision. None of the other board members had been seriously against Alex after Rothman's death anyway; she had been widely unpopular, and their attempt to kill him had only been a reminder to MI6 to stay out of their business, and to their employees that they never forgot an insult. Yassen shrugged.

"Most of us never killed before we were seventeen," he said. "Rothman was wrong to force him into action without any of the proper tools. Like I said – if we give him the training and respect MI6 never did, he will not even need to consider the question."

"So what is your alternative to torturing the boy?" Kroll asked.

"Drugging him? MI6 has never trained him in withstanding that kind of interrogation."

Kroll nodded, and returned his attention to the bulky file in front of him. This time, his dismissal was accepted, and Yassen returned to the cell Alex was in.

"What did Scorpia say?" Alex asked.

"That is none of your business," Yassen said shortly. He went over and picked up a case that had been laying underneath the bed. He placed it on top of the covers.

"You still wish to remain obstinate?" Yassen asked carefully, pulling out a syringe filled with colorless liquid. Alex gulped, but he nodded. Giving up information to Omar was one thing. Giving up information, no matter how trivial it was, to Scopria… that wasn't happening.

He tried to shrink away from the needle, but the restraints kept him from being successful. It pierced his skin easily, and Yasen quickly injected all the contents of the syringe before removing it.

"You have just been injected with a dose of Sodium Thiopental," Yassen informed Alex in a clinical, uncaring tone. It wasn't long before Alex felt the room spinning just slightly off focus. Everything felt fuzzy and indistinct. From what felt like a very far way away, he heard Yassen's voice.

"What do you know about the flash drive I purchased from Hammas?"

Alex was never aware of himself answering.

The next thing he was really aware of, he was awake, still restrained in the bed, and there was another person – presumably a doctor, examining the bullet wound in his side.

"Ah, you are awake," the doctor said, finishing his examination and reapplying the dressings. "I'm Doctor Stevens. Your wound is healing nicely – it nicked a few vital blood vessels, and you nearly bled out. Your heart stopped – twice, I believe, while you were being brought here; a combination of the stress from your previous injury, shock, and blood loss, a rather dangerous combination. As I understand it, one of the men with you preformed a transfusion with a pint and a half of his own blood, which is why you are happily among the living on this fine afternoon."

Alex's head was pounding with a vicious migraine, and he was still struggling to wrap his mind over the jump in his conscious memories. It took him a few moments to fully absorb what the talkative doctor had said.

"What – who?" He asked. Yassen had mentioned something like that when they had first talked, but it had slipped his mind entirely, in the face of everything else that had happened.

"One of the other's being brought in – a solider type, hasn't said much -"

Alex stopped listening.

_Fox. _They had Fox. He had no backup, Yedit was on the run, and Scorpia was about to destroy the world, since it seemed he had just given them the go ahead to do so.

He felt a rush of affection for the SAS man who had literally given him the blood from his veins. He wondered if Fox had known they had compatible blood types, or if Fox was type O. Come to think of it, Alex thought, he didn't even know what his blood type was, which, considering how many times he had needed blood, seemed incredible. He had donated blood at his schools last Red Cross drive, but he had been forced onto this mission before the card with his blood type had ever come back.

Forcing himself not to get sidetracked, Alex turned his attention to the question that seemed to be his almost constant companion over the last few days – getting out.

"When am I going to be let out of bed?" Alex asked, trying to make the question sound as innocuous as possible.

"Well, I'd imagine fairly soon, since I need you to begin physical therapy," Dr. Stevens said. "However, I've been given specific orders to leave you where you are until Gregorovitch has had a word with you."

As if on cue, the door opened, and Yassen was standing there. Alex fought the urge to hurl curses at the man.

The doctor excused himself, and Alex found himself alone with Yassen again.

_Waking up in a cave, with a bunch of Hammas operatives, is such a wonderful way to start a morning, _Alex found himself thinking rebelliously.

"What do you want?" He asked wearily.  
"I believe, at this point, the question is, what Scopria wants with you," Yassen said. "And they want you to join them."

Alex thought for a second that he hadn't heard correctly. And then he wished fervently that he hadn't.

"Why the hell would Scorpia want me?" he asked. "I killed one of their board members and screwed up one of their major operations!"

"Rothman wasn't well liked, little Alex," Yassen said. "As far as most of the board is concerned, they owe you one for getting rid of her so they wouldn't have to."

Alex let that sink in for a moment.

"Scorpia was responsible for the death of my parents, and my uncle, and came about a millimeter away from being responsible for mine," he said. His voice cracked, despite his attempt to mimic Yassen's careful, reasonable tone. He sounded more hysterical than anything.

"Conceded, except for the first point," Yassen said, and went on before Alex could argue that. "If you refuse, you will be allowed to walk out of here on your own two feet, along with the SAS man who was your backup, as soon as our current operation has wrapped up."

Alex stared. Yassen actually seemed to be telling the truth. On the other hand, he was Scorpia. They were experts at lying through their teeth. Alex tried not to follow that thought with a reminder that MI6 was equally skilled with deception.

"If you join Scopria, they will not use you the way MI6 has done, Alex," Yassen said quietly. "They would train you appropriately, so you would always know what you were up against, they would make sure you received proper treatment for any injuries you got, and they would pay you. It wouldn't be like working for MI6, and since Rothman is no longer with us, you wouldn't even need to worry about someone attempting to kill you while you sleep, at least not while you were under Scopria's protection."

Alex glared at Yassen.

"You still believe that MI6 killed my father," he said quietly. "It seems very clear to me that Scopria is lying to you just as much as – if not more than - MI6 is lying to me."

Yassen shrugged, like it was a decision of no real consequence. It wasn't, really. Alex was still a child, and he could harbor no resentment for the teenage spy just because he was acting childishly. Yassen did hope Alex chose Scorpia. But that was only because he could officially stop worrying about whether or not he was going to have to betray his own people over his best friends' son.

"I am merely here to pass along the message," Yassen said. "Scorpia will try your loyalty to them, but no more than any other recruit."

Closing the door behind him with an annoyed snap, Yassen Gregorovitch knew that if he never saw Alex Rider again, it would be far too soon. The boy brought trouble like rats carried plague – it was unavoidable, how he carried it in the very air around him… no, for the sake of his sanity, and his profession, it would be better if he was never involved with the child again.

Alex, on the other side of the door, wanted to scream in frustration. He gave his restraints a desperate tug, hoping to somehow dislodge them from the railing – or tear the rail off the bed, he wasn't picky. Alex fought the panic rising in his chest - every ounce of his being screamed against being restrained so completely. Despair and anger had given way to hatred and desperation.

Hearing the rapid beating of the monitors, Alex forced himself to breathe normally, calming his heart rate. He still had time. He might have been behind the game a little, but so long and the plan wasn't complete, he still had a chance to stop it.

Dr. Stevens came back a few hours later. He examined the bullet wound again, and told Alex without any preamble that he was the luckiest patient he had ever seen. He even removed the IV, declaring that Alex would be able to eat solid food again.

"If you feel even the slightest discomfort, stop eating, and press the button on the side of your bed," Dr. Stevens told him very seriously. "I preformed surgery to remove the bullet, and there wasn't any damage to your intestines that I could see, but stomach wounds are tricky – you're just lucky you took the bullet in your side."

"Yeah, I'm lucky that way," Alex muttered darkly. The doctor's comment had reminded him of Ash – constantly troubled by his injury, unable to eat or sleep normally, constantly downing painkillers - Alex snapped himself back into the real world, reminding himself that this wasn't over yet.

"How can I press the button if my hands are tied to the bed?" Alex asked. Again, he tried to make the question as guileless as possible.

Dr. Stevens wrestled with that for a moment, before finally giving in and removing the leather restraints.

"There are cameras around the room, so don't think that you'll be able to try anything, and you should be really be in bed anyway."

Alex wasn't listening. His mind was already whirring. As soon as Dr. Stevens left, promising that someone would bring in food later, he got out of bed. He made sure to move slowly and carefully, getting the hang of mobility again.

Every muscle in Alex's body was sore, and it took him three tries just to stand up – his legs buckled underneath him.

Swearing violently, and already out of breath, Alex took a step, and then another. He felt the tug at his cut, but it wasn't too painful – then again, Alex knew he still had painkillers in his system. When he made his escape, he wouldn't be able to rely on the pain being dulled.

He sat on the bed for a minute, considering his next plan of action. He saw the camera, looking for it. It was inside the wall, with only the lens visible, on a section of wall he hadn't been able to see while restrained. It felt good just to be able to move, even if he was still trapped.

There was nothing Alex could see that was immediately useful to any kind of escape attempt. And getting out soon was imperative – he still didn't know how long he had been out.

Then he remembered the silver case. Yassen had found it under the bed, which told him it had been there all along. Might it still be there now? Alex didn't have any use for truth serum, but there might be other useful supplies inside.

Alex pulled himself off the bed and sank to his knees. Moving was a chore, but it was getting easier, the longer he was at it. So long as he was conscious of not going too far, Alex figured he still had a chance.

The silver case was there, but it was locked. Alex swore, but, when he shoved it back under the bed, his hand brushed up against another box. Making sure his body was angled with his head on the bed so the camera couldn't see what he was doing, and it looked like he was only resting for a moment, Alex pulled it out.

It was an ordinary first aid kit, white with a red cross on the front. Alex opened it, his heart pounding in anticipation. He rummaged through it carefully, trying not to disturb anything, and move as little as possible.

He found a scalpel, which he palmed, to hide in his bedsheets until he got a chance to use it. Other than that, there was nothing immediately visible that he could use. Alex replaced it and got up, making sure the camera could not catch sight of the scalpel. He got back into bed and pretended to go to sleep. The knife he hid under his pillow for now.

Eventually, he did drift off, exhausted. Alex slept dreamlessly. He needed to be ready for what would come soon. Come hell or high water, the next time he woke up, he was breaking out.


	12. Hell Hath No Fury

Operation: Red Crescent – Hell Hath No Fury

**Hi guys! Here's a quick, bloody, violent, and lovely update to tide you over until I finish studying for AP World History! Actually, totaling up at almost 5,000 words, this is the longest chapter in the whole series. And the fastest written. This chapter practically wrote itself!**

**I hope you enjoy it. I very much enjoyed putting off revision for a few hours to write it. **

**By this point in time, I feel the copyright message is beyond superfluous. If you think AH would take to FANFICTION to write stories, you're bonkers. But to appease the copyright gods by whose existence I survive yet (well, that and the Invisible Pink Unicorn, in all her Galloping Glory), I do not own Alex Rider, its movie, its books, its logos, or anything related to it. I'm also relatively sure I cannot buy Israel, but I will have to speak with the United Nations about my pending request. *Checks email* Nope, nothing yet! **

**Enjoy!**

"_Becoming a member of Scorpia means you sign your life to us," Levi Kroll heard himself speaking, the words taking on a ritualistic echo in the office. The heads of Scopria were all gathered around the man, who was standing in the middle of the office, head slightly bent, as if in prayer. _

"_It means that you will not be able to refuse an assignment, once given, without exceptionally just cause," Dr. Three's continuation of Levi's statements was filled with thinly veiled threat. Was there a shudder, there, in the man who they were speaking to? _

"_It means that failure is intolerable."_

"_It means that you will not betray any secrets you hear about Scorpia and its organization to anyone – any information you hear is for your ears alone."_

"_You will spent at least nine months of the year either in training or on assignment – during those months, you are not allowed to drink, take recreational drugs, or contact any family or friends outside the organization, unless you find yourself in dire circumstances and have the explicit approval of the board member overseeing your assignment."_

"_If you betray us, your death with be painful and long – Scorpia never forgives, and it never forgets."_

_On and on. Around and around the circle they went, each board member listing the rules, the code, of the agents of Scorpia. The man listened quietly, attentively, his face a mask. Was he scared? Nervous? Excited? All of the above? Or, like others, was he in it for the pleasure or the money that killing brought him?_

_Levi still didn't know. What he did know was that he was looking at the man who was sure to be the pride of Scopria – and the scourge of the civilized world. The perfect killer. He was more weapon than man, as dangerous as any of the men and women who stood around him, and possibly even more so. This man was a monster. _

_Finally, Julia Rothman spoke. Her voice was filled with a certain amount of softness, Levi noted with a bit of amusement. Rothman did know that he was married, didn't she? Or did she simply not care, so used to getting what she wanted that the idea of being denied was unthinkable to her?_

"_It means that from this day forward, you are under the protection of Scorpia, and any materials or backup you need are at your disposal," she said. "Any protection you require for your family, anything within reason, is yours. You are a part of a bigger whole, one in which every part is responsible to the other, without cause except that you are both a member of Scorpia. Do you accept all these, your duties, limitations, and freedoms, as an agent of Scorpia?"_

_The man looked up, and met Julia Rothman's eyes with a burning fire. The intent, the passion there, was something Levi had never seen in this particular man before. He had only ever exhibited an iron control, similar to that of Dr. Three, or even Levi himself. There _was _excitement in his face now, but something else – triumph._

"_Yes ma'am," he said._

"_As you accept your duty to the board and Scopria, so do we accept our duty to you," Dr. Three said. He sounded bored. "Welcome to Scorpia, Jonathan Rider."_

Levi Kroll watched the sleeping child's face for a long time, remembering that particular scene. The boy looked almost exactly like his father, on the surface, but Levi's close observation told him otherwise. Unlike his father, Alex brimmed with emotion. He was very good at squirreling it away when he had to work, but he had a temper, and was easily frustrated.

_Must be from his mother, _Levi let that stray thought cross his head. John had always been a creature of middle grounds, a solid shade of grey. Extreme by no one's definition of the word, he hadn't even seemed to have particular religious or political leanings. Once, Levi remembered, he had attempted to try and break that steel control, just for fun. He had attempted to bait the man by drawing him into debate at every opportunity. John Rider had smiled infuriatingly and indulged him, until Three had informed Levi sternly that he was acting as a child. There had been an annoyed twist to Three's jaw then, and Levi wondered just how many times Three had fantasized about torturing Rider.

So the control, the skill (skill that might even surpass his fathers, if he got the right training) came from John, but the temper, the fire? That was unfamiliar to Levi in a Riders face.

Alex was different than John. He was competent – more than competent, really; he was unmatched – but he was not stone. Emotion, if necessary, could be drilled out of a person if it was too damaging, but passion, fire, they were good in an agent, to a certain extent. If Alex learned more control, he would be invaluable. He would be the weapon Scorpia had seen in his father.

But first, they would have to break him. They would have to shatter him and glue him back together, because he would never betray MI6. They couldn't let him return to them. For all he had allowed Yassen to promise Alex his freedom if he declined their offer (which both of them were sure he would), Levi Kroll did not intend to let Alex leave the building. They had him, and they weren't going to let him go.

He turned his attention then, to the other loose end in this project. Miss Yedit Shalom. That woman was both a pleasure and a pain, Levi reflected. He had trained with her for a short time. Single minded in the extreme, utterly devoted to her father, and mistrusted by all. Kroll had chosen her to target because he was sure of two things; first, that her handler would have a way of directly accessing any files he needed from the directors personal computer, if necessary, because of the position of his mole.

Second, that the second even the slightest of easily fabricated and well-placed evidence was brought to light, she would be declared guilty. Mossad was much like Scopria – close but paranoid, united yet hopelessly divided all at once.

But the dammned woman was running around free at the moment.

Once he had finished with Shalom, Kroll decided, casting one last look at his monitor, he would deal with the problem of Alex Rider.

The 'damned woman, meanwhile, was concentrating on breathing. She had just run a fair distance, and she was considerably injured. She was convinced, however, that she had lost her pursuers in the sleepy streets of Rechovot. Now, her problem wasn't discovery, but stopping the end of the world. She didn't know what damage the people Omar was working for could do.

Shit.

Yedit hated working without information. And she hated having to leave a partner behind. But Alex could take care of himself, and they really had to act quickly. She had gone to ground for a week and a half, having to go on the run sometimes to avoid detection. Now, it was time to strike back and end this.

She couldn't take back the codes. Chances were they had already been compromised.

But she could manually change the codes that would make the bombs detonate.

Which meant getting into the Prime Ministers office and rewriting the codes.

Yedit swallowed. She wasn't sure she was good enough to pull something like that off.

She was about to break into Benjamin Netanyahu's office, hack nuclear weapons on his computer, and try and walk away scott free. This was not meant to end well. She would never be able to convince her father of her innocence now.

Perhaps…

Perhaps Alex might still be able to redeem her, Yedit decided. But she couldn't depend on that. She would concentrate on saving her country one last time, like a good patriot, and then she would submit herself to it's justice and pray. To which god, she was not choosy – her religious rituals had taken on a hybrid of Judalism and Islam a long time ago; Judaism, for her culture, Islam for her religious rituals, and a combination of the two in her religious liturgy.

She could not allow personal feelings to affect her final mission, Yedit scolded herself. Even if she damned herself in the eyes of everyone she knew for doing this, she could not simply walk away knowing what she did.

She had wrestled a gun from a Mossad officer in a struggle that was painfully familiar from her days in Fatah and then Hammas, but once out, she had immediately cleaned it of her fingerprints and dumped it. She went to a dealer she knew in Chevron and purchased the arsenal she intended to use to take the Prime Minister's office.

Agent Shalom admired her appearance in a passing shop window – jeans, a causal T-shirt with a Hebrew slogan and sunglasses completed the image of an Israeli teen on break. Her hair had gone from black to streaked blonde, and she had left the contacts out of her eyes. That and a good two hours of scrubbing which considerably lightened her skin, made her look very different than when Mossad had last seen her.

She could have been a soldier off duty, Yedit thought, and that pained her. Or the child of a family that had made Aliyah to Israel, taking a stroll in the brilliant summer sun.

Everyone she had gone to school with, with a possible few exceptions (boys and girls doing national service outside the army, or who had decided to take their education in a super-religious yeshivah), were currently serving to protect her country. When she attacked, she would kill soldiers. Men and women hardly out of High School, who, anywhere else in the world, would be in college. Boys and girls with families, mothers, fathers, friends, siblings, and in some cases, spouses and children, who did not deserve to die.

Yedit hardened her heart.

_This is the job, _she told herself grimly. _Anything to protect Israel._

She hoisted her pack a little higher, very conscious of the firepower it contained. Enough weapons to take down a small government building.

Yedit laughed. That was exactly what she was planning.

There was only one way to approach the building – on Rothschild. But Yedit didn't plan on coming in that way just yet.

A few hopped fences later, she had planted the makeshift bomb she had had inserted into her Star of David necklace. The silver stud in her ear, with an inlaid emerald, was the detonator. The explosion would draw all security to the back of the building, and she would walk up to the Prime Minister's office and do what she had to.

_Even if I get proven innocent, Binjamin is never going to speak to me again after this, _she thought sadly. Her father would be proud, furious, and even understanding, but he would never forgive her either.

_Well, since I'm basically a dead woman walking anyway, _Yedit thought grimly. _Might as well seal my pact with the devil. _She was nearing the entrance on Rothschild, and she hit the detonator.

Even from where she was standing, she felt the explosion. She would have to find out what her contact had put in it, Yedit thought, seeing the plume of fire and smoke already rising, and trying not to think of the men and women who had just been so violently torn from this life.

_Yitkadal Vyitkadash shemi rabah… _she found herself beginning the prayer before she could stop herself. She whispered it as she walked. The front gate was unguarded, and Yedit walked right into the Knesset, her guns still concealed. She would keep up the tourist impression as long as she could – it would save more lives.

She knew the way to Netanyahu's office. She had been there twice, though both times when his predecessor had been in power. She followed the remembered steps, not running into anyone. She saw four groups of guards moving down the hall, but she heard them moving from a long way away, and managed to quickly dodge away before they needed to meet in a confrontation. She continued down the hall, running now.

"_Stop!" _The command was issued in Hebrew. Yedit didn't stop, didn't hesitate. If she had, she would have never gone through with the attack. She swung around and fired once, bringing the officer down with a bullet to the leg. She knocked him out with a blow from her gun (a P99 Walther handgun) and kept moving after placing his body in a storage closet down the hall. She had to remain undetected for a long as she could.

Unfortunately, it seemed that his cry had alerted others. Yedit heard them coming and chose two knew handguns and a tear gas grenade from her bag. She threw the grenade into the hallway with the incoming soldiers, and ran for it before she could feel the effects of the burning gas. She had only been on the receiving end once, but it was painful.

She needed to cut the cameras if she was going to have any chance to get this done quickly. She met another unit of soldiers that she dispatched with her guns and a stun grenade thrown over one shoulder as she was already moving away. She didn't need to look to see that they were already down. She set another bomb in the wing away from the Prime Ministers office, another hopeful distraction, and detonated it once she was standing outside of the main control room. She shot the lock off the door and swung it open. The three technicians in her stared, terrified when she came it. They had probably seen her coming and radioed for help, which was not yet here (or already dispatched by her quick action with the grenades). They had seen her in action, and had no desire to be next.

"Leave, and get out of the building," Yedit ordered in Hebrew, roughly. They all ran, unable to get past her quickly enough. Over a radio, Yedit heard frantic yells that there was a member of parliament hurt. She turned off the radio. She left two grenades in the room, and threw a third in before slamming the door and running for it. The explosion shook the building once again, but Yedit was already on her way to the office of the Prime Minister. She still had one thing left to do.

Four guards were standing outside Netanyahu's door. Yedit threw herself in the attack, hoping to take them all out before they could go for their guns. One of them got a shot off, grazing Yedits arm, but it was painful more than it was dangerous. He was out like a light seconds later. Yedit kicked open the door to her Prime Ministers' office, hyperventilating a little.

"Ah, miss Shalom, is it not?" Netanyahu's voice was calm, collected, as Yedit locked the door from the inside, and turned to the leader of the country she had sworn her life to protect. At this moment, she hated herself more than she could have believed possible for what she was about to do, but there was nothing she could do to fix that. She hid her guilt and self-loathing behind an emotionless and impenetrable mask, and did her duty by the state of Israel.

"Give me your cell and your gun," Yedit ordered, all business, pointing her guns at him. Netanyahu handed them over, and Yedit opened the window and tossed them out. Ordering Netanyahu to stand, she searched his desk and his pockets, and found no other means of communication or weapons around. Satisfied, she stepped away, closed and locked the window, and pulled down the shades.

"I assumed you were originally here to kill me," Binjamin said quietly.

"I'm not," Yedit snapped. She didn't have time for this. She pulled the length of rope she had procured out of her bag, leaving only her dwindling cache of firepower (not that it mattered, since she had no intention of getting out of the building once she was done), and tied her Prime Minister to the chair opposite his desk, making sure his hands were bounded behind him, and his legs were secured to the chair. She could take no chances.

"Say anything, and I will shoot you," she added threateningly, placing her handgun on the desk inches away from her fingers. She began working the computer as quickly as she could type.

She needed to concentrate. The files with the codes she would need were already on the computer.

Three ironies occurred to her as she began her grueling search.

The first was that Khalid had taught her everything she knew, to this day, about electronics and modern technology. Without his help, Yedit wouldn't know how to turn on a computer. Her skills, rudimentary at best, were going to have to be supplemented by her captive.

The second irony was that she had the _fucking prime minister as a hostage. _

The third was that despite both the first and second ironies, she was sitting here, cold as ice, still _doing her job _(How many times had Yedit thought to herself that she simply loathed those words?), and she was probably going to die for it.

_Come on, come on, Omar did this, with all the training he received in a hole in the desert, hiding beneath sick children so the army couldn't kill him, _she told herself. But the fact of the matter was, that she was just not proficient with computer technology the way say… Dani, or her brother was.

After a few minutes of frantic searching, she finally consented to ask for help. But before she could ask Netanyahu to expedite the process, her train of thought was interrupted by the harsh ringing of the office phone.

When Alex awoke, he didn't open his eyes right away. The memories of his last few brutal wakeups were heavy in his mind, and he wasn't sure he was quite ready to face it. After a few seconds, when he could detect no other signs of life around him, he slowly opened his eyes.

Getting out of bed was still a painful venture, and Alex gave up desperately halfway through.

How on earth was he going to stop this? He couldn't even get out of this cell, let alone get his hands on that stupid flash drive. And besides, Scorpia was sure to have made a backup and sent it along to their client already.

Alex no longer entertained visions of himself being able to save the day. He had failed.

_But Agent Shalom is still out there, _he thought. And he had information that could save her life. He might have failed, but wherever Yedit was, there was every chance she was taking action to remedy the situation. What he needed to get was proof.

Everything of Alex's – his shoes, his clothes, the gun Yedit had given him - was gone. All he had was the scalpel he had taken, which he was reasonably sure was useless to him now – the tiny knife was a joke, like taking on Hammas with a bit of broken lightbulb.

But there was still something he had left. Alex had been aware of it before, but had dismissed the knowledge immediately, because of the few gadgets Smithers had been able to procure for him, the recording device wasn't one of the more useful ones in an escape attempt. But the woven bracelet around his ankle concealed a tiny recorder.

If he could get a message back… no, better still, if he could get a message to mossad, with this information…

Trying to conceal his actions, Alex turned away from the camera and curled up so that he could reach the bracelet. He cut the strings attaching it to his ankle with the scalpel, and held it loosely in his hand.

What should he say? How much should he divulge? And who to send it to? Mossad would already suspect Yedit's innocence, but overrunning the last of their doubts might not be enough to save Yedit. But he couldn't risk alerting Mossad to his existence – Blunt had already made the consequences of that for international relations between Britain and Israel, and possibly even the United States, as well, would be disastrous.

The door opened and closed, and Alex looked up.

The man standing next to the door was Israeli, from what Alex could see of his face. He had a black beard that covered the bottom half of his face, and one of his eyes was obscured by a black eye patch.

"Do you know who I am, Alex Rider?" The man asked. The accent was definitely Israeli. Alex shook his head, taking a second to stall, and hit the record button on his bracelet.

"My name is Levi Kroll, and I am one of the founding members of Scopria," the man said. "I served on the board while your father was with us."

"If your going to kill me, please use a gun, not boredom," Alex said. What he could see of Kroll's lips sneered.

"Have you rethought your answer to Gregorovitch?" Kroll asked. Alex glared at him.

"No."

"Shame then," Levi said with a shrug. Alex glared at him suspiciously.

"Do you know where Yedit is?" he asked quietly. It was no or never. He held his breath, wondering if Kroll would take the bait on the change of topic.

"Agent Shalom is in Jerusalem right now," Kroll said. "She purchased a huge store of weapons in Chevron. I was curious to see what she would do, so I ordered my men not to kill her. It seems she used the arsenal to break into the parliament building of Israel."

Alex stared, horrified, at the board member. What was Yedit _doing? _She was damning herself in the eyes of her country. There was nothing that could save her now, even if her actions did save the world. No one would ever know…

That made it all the more important that he keep Kroll talking.

"But she's innocent!" Alex protested, more to get a rise out of Kroll than in real outburst.

"Yes, but after all, being set up by your own brother, that's got to sting," Kroll said joyfully. "It was a brilliant touch on Yassen's part, when I told him to implicate Yedit. It would be too easy – and Yedit, the patriotic, spiritual, perfect Yedit, would fall, by her own brother's hand. Director Shalom must be crippled with shame by now, wouldn't you say, Alex?"

"She must be up to something," Alex growled. This was going better than he had ever thought to imagine!

"Well, when one finds out that their partner has been captured by a dangerous terrorist organization like Scopria, that their brother is a total bastard, and that their countries nuclear weapons have been compromised… I am sure they'll do almost anything," Kroll said. Alex hated him for the glee in his voice. "It's not like she has anything left anymore, is it?"

There was a few moments of silence, and Alex clicked off the recording device, glad that it didn't make any noise. A few seconds later, he was very glad of it, because what Kroll said next was something that MI6 did _not _need to find out about like this.

"Ah, by the way," Kroll began after a few seconds of silence while Alex digested his words. "That soldier fellow, SAS, I believe that decided to let himself get captured to save your life, and then gave you over a pint of his own blood when you died… what was his name…?"

Alex stared at the man, unsure as to what had brought about this sudden change of topic.

"Ben," he growled the name through his teeth. What had Scorpia done?

"Ah, that's right," Levi said. There was a vicious gleam in his eyes. "Ben Daniels. The young patriot is particularly devoted to you it seems – he took the deal we offered him without question – he would be able to see you, and make sure you were okay, if he defected."

Alex felt his stomach roll. His hand closed into a fist around the scalpel under his pillow, wanting more than anything to stab it into this man's heart, over and over again. He wanted to bathe every ocean red with this man's blood. Ben had given up everything. Everything! What had he been thinking?

"I think I should let you two discuss this," Kroll said, turning, and opening the door.

Fox stepped through uncertainly. He flinched – actually _flinched – _away from Kroll as the Israeli passed, giving them the semblance of privacy.

"You alright Cub?" Fox asked quietly. He looked exhausted.

"You shouldn't have done this," Alex said.

"S'not so bad," Fox said.

"You saved my life," Alex added. "I think if we keep this up, I'm going to owe you my life a hundred times older before I'm even old enough to properly join MI6," he joked lightly. Fox chuckled.

"It's one of the plusses of being O-neg, Cub – you may only be able to get O-neg back, but your blood is useful wherever you go."

"So its O-negative: blood for every occasion?" Alex asked. The SAS man laughed. His body wracked with the sound, and Alex had to look away. Scorpia had utterly destroyed Ben Daniels. He added that to the mental list of the reasons he needed to get revenge on Scorpia.

"You look like hell, Cub," he said.

"I could say the same for you," Alex shot back, and the tense atmosphere was back again. Fox shrugged.

"Like I said, its not so bad," he said. "I just don't sleep much these days is all."

Alex wanted to yell at Fox, but that wasn't fair. It was ridiculous that he should be angry with Fox for what Scopria had done, how Scopria had used him. What could Fox have seriously done?

_He could have not tried to save me, _Alex thought.

"Can you do me another favor?" Alex asked, deciding to seize his chance. Scorpia might not let Fox leave yet, but he might come in contact with someone who would be able to get his message to MI6. Fox gave him a quizzical looked, but nodded.

"I don't think Scorpia plans to let me go anytime soon," Alex began. "And if their intention is to make me one of the, they're going to have more trouble than they bargained for. A few years ago, my uncle got this for me - " Alex held up the woven bracelet – "when we were in Chile together. Can you make sure it gets back to my guardian, Jack?" he asked. He met Fox's eyes, and he hoped Fox understood the unspoken message. _Get this to MI6 with whatever speed you can muster. _"I don't want her thinking I've gone and died on her."

Fox took the bracelet and nodded.

"I'll make sure this gets where you need it to go," he said, putting it in his pocket. If Ben knew what it contained, he showed no surprise.

"Be careful Cub," Fox said.

"Watch your back, Fox," Alex answered. A moment of indecision crossed Ben's face, but he turned away. The door opened as he reached it, and Alex's one last hope of escape went with him.

Alex lay back. The thought occurred to him that this was his first failed mission ever. The thought made him cringe a little. Not that he had expected to always have a perfect record – but it would have been nice.

Ian had been a baseball fan, and there had been one game in which the pitcher had managed to strike every person on the other team. Ian had kept yelling at the set, cheering on the pitcher who was on the way to pitching a perfect game – as much of a rarity as a spy who never failed, Alex supposed.

On his last pitch of the game, a particularly good batter managed to make contact with the ball. He only made it to third base, but he had ruined the pitchers perfect game. The man stopped off the field furiously. He had been _so _close.

But Ian had grinned, and turned to Alex.

"There's nothing wrong with a one-hitter," he said. "Its just as rare, and it takes just as talented a pitcher. And besides, he had already won the game for them when the rest of the team stepped in to made sure he never scored."

Alex had nodded then.

There was nothing wrong with a one-hitter. Hopefully, Yedit would be able to stop Scopria from 'crossing home,' to continue with the baseball analogy.

And hopefully, he could save her in return.

Because it didn't look like he was going anywhere. And he _really _wasn't going to give up to Scorpia without a fight.

Not now. Not ever again. He had made that mistake once, and learned his lesson.

He was a spy.

And he had a job to do.


	13. Highly Explosive

Operation: Red Crescent – Highly Explosive

**I don't know how much longer this fic will be, possibly only another chapter or two. Fortunately for all of you, I think I'll continue on this train of thought, and write a sequel, to deal with the 'mysterious threat' that drove Alex into this mission in the first place.**

**What do you say? Shall we see more of Alex in another fiction? Or have you guys gotten fed up with me already? If I get enough good feedback, I'll start thinking about tying in the new storyline, otherwise, I still have Where the Wild Things Are and A History of Magic to finish (which you should all totally check out). **

**So? Review and let me know what you think!**

**Wish me luck on my AP World History test tomorrow!**

**Disclaimer: Two words: **_**Fan. **_**And **_**Fiction. **_

Agent Shalom froze as the sound of the office phone ringing cut through the clicking of the keyboard for the second time.

"You should probably take that," Netanyahu said. "I expect by now that will be some sort of hostage negotiator."

_Fuck. _

She hadn't had enough time! If she could just have some more time, to pull off the miracle she needed to…

The phone rang again, and she picked it up, swallowing. She was going to have to stall whatever rescue forces they had coming. And that meant she was going to have to damn herself even further.

"Shalom?" The voice on the other end was light, male, and comforting. He was speaking in Hebrew, so when he first spoke, Yedit thought he was addressing her by name. She was relatively certain that he was just using the Hebrew greeting, though, and she responded in Arabic – the kind of street Arabic that spread through slums of Palestinian refugee camps. They would be more careful dealing with an unknown than with someone they already knew a great deal about.

"_What do you want?" _she demanded harshly.

"_The question is more what you want, I think,_" the negotiator on the other line said, switching smoothly to her dialect of Arabic without pause. Yedit had to admire him.

"_Keep your men out of the building or I will shoot your Prime Minister,_" she said. She made it sound as forceful as she could – better they think her unbalanced. "_This building is rigged to blow – unless you want a gaping hole in your Parliament, stay away._"

There was silence on the other end. The negotiator was relaying her demands.

"_Is there anything else?_"

Yedit cast around frantically. _Time! _She needed time! And she was wasting too much of this talking to the negotiator.

"_Only know that unless you wish Binjamin Netanyahu to die, you will not set foot inside this building."_

With that, she slammed the phone down. Her hands were shaking.

"You don't have to do this," Netanyahu said quietly, moving back to Hebrew. Yedit laughed.

"You think I'm simple," she accused him. "I do have to do this. Certain key information has become compromised, through the actions of a group that would have me held responsible for the theft. I'm here to rectify that. Whatever my father wishes can happen then, once I am satisfied that untold death and destruction aren't imminent."

"What information?" Netanyahu asked.

Yedit shrugged. She wasn't going to let him stall her. She kept on with her search.

_This is taking too long! _She wanted to scream in frustration but she kept her emotions well hidden, and forced herself to try and slow her racing heart.

"…Look, guys… he's in pretty bad shape. You need to get him out of here. Plain and simple. I know you want me to stay, and getting Alex out would blow my cover, but you can't just leave him. He's a child! Scopria would tear him to pieces in a heartbeat!"

The recording cut off. Mrs. Jones looked up at Blunt expectantly. They had not expected this development.

"Daniels does make an excellent point," Mrs. Jones said, hating herself for it. "He can't get Alex out, and we need an in on Scopria. We haven't had one since John Rider, and _that _fiasco was more than-"

"I am well aware of the dangers of Alex finding out the truth, Tulip. Rest assured, he will not. My predecessor erred, as we both know quite well. He both under and over estimated Jonathan, and that is all we need say concerning the issue."

He looked down at the bracelet, his face blank.

"As for Alex," he shrugged. "Perhaps two agents are better than one. And Daniels has already told us that he does not think his cover will hold up without the threat of them hurting Alex. He is playing the dutiful guardian angel, at the moment."

Mrs. Jones pressed her lips together. She was angry that Blunt would twist the situation so, even if she had first voiced the idea, but there was nothing she could do. And he was right – this was an unequalled opportunity to strike at Scopria.

"And if we have another John Rider on our hands?" she demanded.

"Surely you don't think that we need to concern ourselves with that here?" Blunt asked lightly. "After all, he was completely willing to abandon Scopria, without so much as a suggestion of violence."

"John never showed any of the signs," Mrs. Jones snapped, before she could stop herself. "Not until-"

"Enough, Tulip," Blunt said. "We leave Alex to Scorpia, for now."

"And what of this… problem… in Israel?" Mrs. Jones asked.

"I'll have Smithers send this tape along to the Israeli's, minus Daniels' report," Blunt said. "As I understand it, Yedit is currently holding Netanyahu hostage in his own office, however, so they might be a bit busy at the moment."

"What does she hope to achieve?" Mrs. Jones asked.

"From this tape, I would say she intends to gain control over Israel's nuclear weapons and change the code manually," Blunt said. It didn't sound like he particularly cared.

"We'll observe, and step in with the tape if she succeeds," he decided.

"Perhaps I could help you?" Netanyahu asked. Yedit had been frantically typing for over twenty minutes now. She had found the codes she needed, under level after level of encryption, but that was the easiest part of the whole thing. She looked up and swore angrily, using a Hebrew word that was the very nasty equivalent of 'shut the hell up.'

Netanyahu shrugged.

"My purpose alone would damn me, since none of you will believe the truth," she said.

"Perhaps I would?" Netanyahu suggested. Yedit glared at him. He sounded just innocent enough to be genuinely offering help. But she knew better. He was stalling. He was too good a politician to be stupid enough to try and cooperate with a terrorist.

It was another five frantic minutes before the sound of a phone ringing split the silence around them. But this time, it was her cell, not the office phone. Yedit picked it up hesitantly.

"There are six units of soldiers ready to barge into the Knesset building, and blast their way to the office."

The voice was female, and British, and the line went dead the instant it had stopped talking. Too short for the call to ever be traced.

But Yedit knew the identity of the speaker anyway.

The Deputy Director of MI6. Which meant they still believed she was innocent. That had to mean that Alex was free, and that he had managed to get the truth out! She sighed in relief, but when she put the phone back into her bag, the realization of what Mrs. Jones had told her sunk in.

_Zonah! _She thought angrily. She added another few choice mental words before she turned to the Prime Minister.

"I need access to change the codes to activate Israel's nuclear missiles," she said. "Everything will be explained, and you don't even have to tell me the password you change it to, but you need to change it _now. _Or millions of people are going to die."

She let those words hang in the air. Netanyahu locked eyes with her.

"If we are interrupted before the change can happen, untold destruction will ensue," she pleaded.

"Is that a threat?" Netanyahu asked calmly.

"No."

Netanyahu regarded her for a moment.

"Untie me then," he said. "If you're telling the truth, even a change of code wouldn't hurt."

Yedit felt relief flood her whole body. It was done. Mission accomplished.

She approached Netanyahu and cut the ropes around his wrists and legs with the knife she had carried in a sheath in her boot.

Netanyahu moved faster than Yedit was ready to accept. Injured, exhausted, and complacent, Netanyahu was easily able to pin her against the desk, grabbing the gun as he did. Yedit struggled briefly against the Prime Minister's hold, but stilled the moment she felt the icy touch of a gun against her temple.

Yedit issued a line of curses that ran across at least three languages before the click of the gun warned her to be quiet.

Alex was quietly reciting a mantra in his head.

_Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Angola… _

In his freshman year of high school, Alex's world history teacher, Mr. Mullin, had been obsessed with memorization. One of the worst had been an assignment where each of them had had to recite every country in the world, alphabetically, for their final. Alex had only missed one, having forgotten Serbia from his list. Even now, looking back, Alex had to admit a twinge of embarrassment for that particular mishap.

_Antingua and Barbuda… _

Now, however, Alex was grateful. The quiet recitation of every country in the world was claming, in a way he supposed was similar to prayer. He had never really prayed, but it seemed like that sort of thing.

And it was the endless list that was calming him, stopping him from screaming, pounding on the door and trying to do something – anything.

MI6 was not going to come. Looking into Fox's eyes, Alex had already known that MI6 would leave him, either because they felt they couldn't trust him, or because they needed another agent inside Scorpia. Alex's capture gave them a chance for another spy.

Like Alex's father had been.

Alex tried to fight the panic that was rising again as he stopped his list, halfway through the 'B's. He started up again, letting the frantic beeping of the monitor behind him slow.

_Brazil, Bulgaria, Burkina-Faso, Benin…_

Alex made it all the way down to Zimbabwe, and started over again.

It was useless and menial, but that's what Alex needed. If only his English teacher had been so obsessed, Alex thought ruefully, he could have added Shakespeare to the mindless recitation he was doing!

Over and over.

He was stuck here. He needed something to anchor him, because otherwise, he would surely give in, or go mad. Neither sounded like an appealing option.

"Why?" Netanyahu asked.

"I told you, I'm here to stop a catastrophe," Yedit growled. Netanyahu picked up her phone, and dialed with one hand, the other one keeping the gun on her. Yedit took a deep breath, and kicked out, catching the Prime Minister unawares. She recovered her phone as the Prime Minister staggered away, dropping the gun; She had hit him rather painfully.

What was she trying to achieve any more? She wasn't going to be able to find the codes on her own – she wasn't good enough with computers. She watched the Prime Minister recover himself, considering her situation.

"By the desk, now," she snapped. Netanyahu watched her warily, but he did as she asked.

As he sat back at his desk, the phone rang again.

"Don't pick it up, Yedit ordered. Netanyahu's hand paused above the receiver, and Yedit shot it once, cutting off the obnoxious ringing.

"Was that necessary?" Netanyahu asked. Yedit didn't answer.

"Change the codes on Israel's nuclear weapons," Yedit said. "I have no qualms killing you in order to protect the thousands of people that would die when Scorpia hands over these codes to whoever bought them."

Netanyahu shook his head, still unbelieving. But reluctantly, he started typing.

Downstairs, Yedit heart and felt a massive explosion. She had set a few tripwires wired to explosives downstairs. This meant that the forces were already shoving their way into the building.

"With more haste, if you please," she said coldly. Netanyahu marginally picked up the speed of his typing.

Another explosion, this one closer. Netanyahu looked up, annoyed.

"Did you intend to destroy the whole building?" he demanded. Yedit shrugged.  
"How many people do you intend to kill with this madness?" he continued icily.

Yedit glared, but she had no answer for that. She hated that she had to kill, but as much as that hurt, a nuclear bomb hitting Israel was ten times worse.

"Just keep typing," she said, fiddling with the ring on her right hand. The last reminder of what Muntasir had been to her. A useful tool she had thankfully never needed to use.

Until today.

Slams in the hallway just outside told her that the IDF was almost upon her. Damn, they had gotten here fast!

_What did you think? _She asked herself, amused. _This is what they're trained for._

She pulled the ring off her hand, and pressed down on the engraving on the front. Acting quickly, she slid the ring under the door. She didn't hear the bomb containing tear gas go off, but she heard the coughing and screams that accompanied it.

Netanyahu had stopped typing, and was staring at the door in horror.

"Stop this," he begged her. "Spill no more blood this day."

"I can't do that," Yedit whispered. Her eyes were fixed on the door. The shouts in Hebrew filled the air behind it – they were getting ready to storm the room.

"Keep typing," Yedit ordered, looking away. This could _not _all be for nothing.

"Give yourself up, and we will not shoot!" the shout came from the other side of the door. Her father.

Panic rose in Yedit's chest. She was dead. Plain and simple, she was dead.

And she had nothing left to throw out. She was injured and exhausted, and she had failed.

The weight of that failure crushed her. How many people had she killed today, all for a fool's chance? Had she honestly thought of herself as some sort of invincible superhero, someone who would never die, never loose, never fall short?

And yet, how could she have failed so spectacularly?

The door blast open, slamming to the floor. Yedit stared at the open doorway, disbelief and fear paralyzing her. She didn't know how many soldiers slammed her to the floor, disarming her, searching for other weapons, binding her arms behind her back.

Someone was shouting, but she wasn't quite able to understand what he was saying. Yedit felt distant, removed, from everything that was happening. And then -

"Director, its your-"

Yedit didn't see the death-glare that her father must have given the soldier, or the agent, to make the soldier shut up, but she knew he must have done so for no sounds or words reached her ears, yet the man shut up.

And then his face filled her vision.

"What do you have to say for yourself?" he asked. Yedit only shook her head grimly.

"You didn't believe be then, you won't believe me now," she said, meeting his eyes. She was not afraid of her father any more. He only snorted, and stepped away.

"Bring her in," he ordered.

Yedit felt the sharp twinge of a needle entering her arm, and she didn't even attempt to fight the darkness that surrounded her. She let herself slip away from consciousness, away from the feelings of anger and overwhelming guilt.

It was over.


	14. A Touch Of Fate

Operation: Red Crescent – A Touch of Fate

**Wow, is it done already? Holy crap, I guess so… Coming in at just under 50,000 words, this is officially one of the longest stories I've ever written. I'm actually quite proud of it.**

**Now – to business: First off, there **_**will**_** be a sequel, entitled _Operation: Bury Your Dead_. Keep your eyes open, because I'm putting it up soon, after I get in a new chapter apiece for each of my other fictions. **

**For the sequel, I think I know where I want to go with it, but at the same time, I don't really, so any and all feedback is awesome. And no, I'm not review mongering. I do want to hear from ya'll, now that we've made it to this juncture.**

**Anyway, it's been a real pleasure, and I hope you do keep reading with me, but if you don't, I hope you've enjoyed the ride. I certainly did. =)**

**What part of **_**FAN**__**FICTION**_** do you copyright lawyers not understand? Was it the 'fan' or the 'fiction' part that tripped you up?**

………………………………………………………………………

Yedit Shalom opened her eyes blearily. She was in an interrogation room, far below the building that masqueraded as the headquarters of Mossad in Rechovot. Her hands were cuffed to the table in front of her.

The agent felt her steely control slip.

_I'm getting too old for this, _she realized, almost amused by the thought. Barely twenty-one, and yet she was too old! The thought _was_ amusing. And yet, at the same time, it was not quite what she had meant.

_I'm getting too old for playing the traitor, _she amended her internal and unspoken complaint. As a child, she had craved rebellion, enjoyed waving her illicit activities in her father's face.

But now… now she was a soldier. She was too patriotic, to invested in Israel, to have to keep pretending to betray it. Perhaps, if she ever got out, she would join the army. Nice and simple and clean, as far as she was concerned. She didn't fear violence or pain, or death.

The door snapped open. Yedit had expected her father to walk in, but it was Dani. He closed the door behind him, and sat across from her.

"I think you need to hear something," Dani said, placing the Notebook computer he had been carrying onto the table between them. He hit the spacebar, and a recording started playing.

"My name is Levi Kroll…"

_Alex._

He had been captured.

Yedit forced her face to remain impassive as she listened to Alex trading snarky comments with the man. She shook her head outright when she heard him daring Kroll to torture him. The boy was what, sixteen, tops?

The recording shut off, and Dani met Yedit's eyes.

"We verified the identity of the man speaking," he said. "Levi Kroll used to work for us, and became rather… disheartened after he finished his work in Mossad. He is one of the founding members of the criminal organization Scorpia, and he is a very dangerous man."

_Most of the men I know are, _Yedit wanted to say.

"What we do not know is the identity of the boy who is speaking," Dani said. "I assume that he is the same teenager that helped you escape Mossad in Egypt."

"How did you get this tape?" Yedit asked, neither confirming nor denying what Dani had said. How he had gotten the tape was directly related to how much she felt she could tell him about Alex. If he had gotten it from British Intelligence, she would give him the full story. But if Alex himself had sent it, she would have to do a bit of covering up. MI6 would not thank her for outing Alex if they didn't want Mossad to know.

"MI6 told us one of their agents had recovered it," Dani said. He stared at the tape in sudden realization.

"Not – the boy?" Dani's voice was weak. Yedit nodded.

"MI6 hoped that he could help me recover the missing information," she said. "They needed to get him out of London for a bit, and he's apparently quite a good agent…" her voice faded off.

"He'll get out," she said, confidently. Dani looked unsure. He shook his head, and then gulped.

"Yedit, this afternoon…"

He looked almost like he was going to be sick, Yedit thought uneasily. Surely he couldn't only be referring to her destruction of the Knesset building?

"A nuclear bomb nearly landed in Jerusalem," Dani said. "It was shot down, but it destroyed a lot of the surrounding area. The city has been largely vacated, because we don't know what kind of lasting damage there has been."

Yedit stiffened. How many people were dead? How many of those deaths could have been avoided if she had acted faster?

"It's a small consolation now, but both Netanyahu and your father feel that this is more than enough proof of your innocence. You're to be reinstated in Mossad, if that is what you want," Dani said. The challenge was there: he wouldn't blame her for walking away, but he would never see her the same for it.

"As a full agent," Yedit qualified. "No more of this playing the traitor business. We both know I'm useless as a mole now. My job lies in the shadows. It always has."

Dani nodded. He stood and unlocked Yedit's handcuffs, helping her stand.

Yedit stood, and followed her fellow agent upstairs, into a much-changed world. How much a difference a few hours made! She knew that Israel was doing to need agents like her if it was going to survive. It was time to turn her attention to the defense of her world.

Yedit was surrounded by a icy calm, but inside of her, there was a tiny little girl, crying and sobbing, gasping for air, mourning those deaths.

_Yitkadal V'titkadash Shemei Rabbah…_

_Glorified and sanctified be His name…_

………………………………………………………………………

Hours of boredom turned to days.

The only person Alex saw was Dr. Stevens, and the ever present guards just outside of his door.

His strength returned quickly.

Every spare second, Alex worked on improving his dexterity, his endurance. He went through kata after kata, fighting through the boredom, imagining the day when he would finally break free. Being stuck in this tiny room was getting to him – he had always been a solitary person, but this complete lack of contact from any person was unnerving and unsettling. How long would Scorpia just leave him here?

Alex knew he should be grateful. At least he wasn't being tortured.

Days wore on, and Alex was finally outside in the hallway. Unheeding of the guards at either side, Alex ran the length of the hall several times, reveling in his freedom. He was disappointed when his antics failed to raise a reaction from either stony-face guard, but he wasn't complaining. He was free.

Days bled together, and Alex had no idea how long he'd been in captivity when Levi Kroll came back.

"Hello, Alex," he said pleasantly. "I'm glad to see you've regained much of your former strength."

"Well, when you've got nothing but time," Alex said cautiously.

"Have you reconsidered our offer?" Kroll asked.

"Yeah, I have," Alex said. "And I'm not joining you guys. End of conversation. Now if you could just drop me off at-"

"It doesn't work like that Alex," Levi said, smiling. "And it would be a shame for us to have to kill that Daniels fellow when he really is shaping up to be such a good agent."

Alex froze at the unconcealed threat in those words.

"That's messed up," he said. "You got him to switch sides by threatening me, so now you're going to make me do the same by threatening Ben?"

"It is as Julia Rothman told you," Levi said, sounding bored. "The world is not black and white. Grow up and accept it."

"I'm not saying that MI6 are the good guys," Alex said. "What I'm saying is that you lot are a bunch of bastards, and you killed my dad."

"Is carrying the grudge of your father worth the pain?"

"Was it worth it to try and shoot me when I killed Julia Rothman?" Alex glared back.

"You will agree to join us in the end," Levi said calmly. "Might it not be as well without all the pain? What do you gain by holding out?"

His voice was light, more curious than threatening. But Alex knew that there was nothing but malice hiding behind that innocent – sounding curiosity.

"Surely you still cannot defend the actions of MI6, not when they have intentionally thrown you into the path of danger so many times? Not when they have so completely disregarded your life?"

Alex grit his teeth together. MI6 _had _used him. They _had _risked his life countless times, forcing him to do things he was almost one hundred per cent sure no other teenager had ever been force to do. He had been shot at, tortured, nearly killed more times than he could even count at this point, and had dived into some of the most dangerous situations that existed. Could he really stand up for them? Scorpia might at least care whether or not he lived or died…

"Some fights need to be fought, regardless of the cost," he said quietly, Yedit's words giving him the best response he could think of to buy himself time. "And Scorpia is an agency that must be fought."

He let that thought keep his courage steady as Levi considered him. Was the tiny upwards turn at the edge of his mouth because he could hear the uncertainty in Alex's voice? Could he really tell that Alex didn't believe what he was saying, or did he just want to fuck with his head? And then, without warning, he turned.

"You will beg to serve this board on bended knee before we are done with you," he said. No malice, no hate. It was like he was stating plain fact.

Alex shivered.

He would _not _fall before Scorpia.  
He would fight, and he would escape, and help Ben get out of here too.

Just… getting out of this room, the impossible step one, was going to prove a bit of a challenge.

What if he just pretended to give up? Would they believe him?

Alex considered that. He doubted it. They had to know that he would take any chance he could get to try and escape. He was sure that he would be watched very carefully every second he was no longer in his cell.

_You could become your father, _a voice in his head whispered. _Spy on Scorpia, do the job better than anyone, and be the spy he was killed being. That's what Rider's do, isn't it?_

Alex hesitated. He didn't want to hide forever as a killer.

Truth be told, he wanted to go home and be a student until he was old enough to actually be a spy. He wanted to enjoy some of what he had of his childhood left.

If he had been at school right now, he would have been starting to think about college applications – and, like the rest of the junior class, enviously watching the seniors received their news back.

He wanted that. He wanted the normalcy of worrying about whether or not he was going to get into the colleges he had applied to, not the moral dilemma of whether or not he should kill someone. One day, Alex knew, he wanted to be a spy. It was in his blood, like a chronic disease, and there was no way he could avoid it now. But he didn't want to have to face that today, or this year. He wanted to graduate high school, get a degree, get a girlfriend. He was too young for this to all be on his head just yet.

Alex closed his eyes and pushed that thought out of his mind.

He was no longer too young. Not too young for MI6 to use him, and not too young for Scorpia to shatter him into a thousand tiny little pieces of agony, just to get him to work for them. He wasn't even too young to die.

_Which might just happen if I can't get out of here, _Alex thought uneasily. The perfect white of the walls had started driving him crazy days ago, and the lack of companionship was starting to get to him.

He needed a plan.

………………………………………………………………………

"Are we ready to proceed?" The voice was sharp, tinged with a South African accent. It belonged to the red-haired man who sat at the head of the long table.

"At your command," the man on his right said.

The South African man nodded in approval at the statement. His planning, almost ten years in the making, was proving to be effective. Soon, he knew, all of the world would bow before him.

The man's name had once been Evert Zaaiman. He had been born in South Africa under the Apartheid laws, and he had made his escape as soon as he was eighteen, moving to the states for an education heavy in constitutional law and history. He had a photographic memory, and had been top of his class when he graduated.

He would have become a lawyer if he hadn't decided that he enjoyed killing more.

Working with Scorpia had shown him that he was brilliant, not simply in the realm of the classroom, but also with a gun and a target.

Working with Scorpia had also shown him how annoying it was to play second fiddle to the members of the board, who hadn't hired any new members since they had briefly considered promoting John Rider over sixteen years ago.

There was no room for mobility, for change.

Evert intended to create new openings for a younger and more ambitious generation of killers. Unfortunately, that meant a coup of Scopria, and the death of all but one of the board members, an Australian man who sat exactly opposite him.

"We shall soon be very rich then, eh, Devon?" Evert asked, toasting the Australian man when he caught his eye. The Australian smiled, and toasted him back.

"And what of Alex Rider?"

The question was posed by one of the assassins halfway down the table. Evert met the Russian man's eyes.

"Why do you ask?"

"Rider is a child, but he is reasonably skilled," Yassen Gregorovitch said. "Should he become involved, your plans will fail – the boy has an unnatural talent for finding the perfect place to jam a monkey wrench into a perfectly well functioning machine to make it stop, usually by sheer dumb luck."

"Is it your suggestion that we kill the boy?" The Australian man going by the name of Devon asked lazily.

"No," Yassen said. "I believe we should allow him to return to MI6 and allow them to send him on some mission halfway across the world, in the United States, or Columbia, or wherever, and let them do the work keeping him out of our hair."

"Kroll seemed under the impression that you very much wished Rider to become a member of Scopria," Devon said carefully.

"I wished to cease being in the child's presence," Yassen snapped. "He is annoying in the extreme, and I do not enjoy torturing children."

"Very well," Evert said before Devon could respond. There was no need for them to fight amongst themselves, after all, not when they had a coup waiting for them to begin. "Rescue the boy, send him on his way, and do whatever is necessary to keep him away from our operation," he finished. Yassen nodded, and Evert turned the tone of the discussion to the much more serious question of beginning their takeover.

A civil war was about to begin in Scorpia..

………………………………………………………………………

The door opened, punctuating Alex's thoughts on a plan of escape.

Yassen Gregorovitch was standing in the doorway.

"Come quickly," he said, his voice low and urgent.

Alex immediately knew something wasn't quite right with this situation. Yassen looked… apprehensive? Almost scared. His thoughts were confirmed when he joined Yassen at the door, seeing the two guards outside knocked out.

"Why are you helping me?" Alex asked quietly as they headed down the hallway at a fast pace. Alex was pleased that the movement didn't even draw an ache from his wounds, which seemed to have finally healed. He would be able to keep up with Yassen, at the very least.  
"Why don't we consider this repayment for me sending you to Scorpia to begin with, and say that you'll still owe me for taking a bullet for you," Yassen said casually. Alex glanced at the assassin's face. Was he making a joke?

"Speaking of which," he began. "Why _did _you send me to Scorpia?"

"I assumed that you deserved to know the truth about your father," Yassen said bluntly.

"Yet Scorpia only lied to be further," Alex replied, following Yassen through the doorway and up a stairwell. So far, they hadn't meant anyone, but it was only a matter of time.

"I know," Yassen said.

Alex would have asked more – the question of Yassen's miraculous survival was still weighing heavily on his mind – but a shot fired in the stairway, followed by a few yells, made him realize that he had more immediate and pressing issues to deal with.

_Crazy bastard, _Alex thought as he heard the bullet ricocheting through the stairwell.

"Come on," Yassen said, pulling open one of the doors leading onto a higher floor. Alex surmised that he must have been held underground.

"Wait," Alex said suddenly as they rushed down the hall. He had stopped dead.

"Alex, it is time to _move!_" Yassen said forcefully, trying to pull him down the hall.

"Ben," Alex said, looking around as if the ceiling would give him a clue as to where the former SAS man was.

"You can't worry about him now!" Yassen growled. "I cannot help him get out too."

Alex felt the weight of those words on his heart like a stone.

"I will look out for him, but we have to move," Yassen said quietly, pulling Alex along. This time, the teenager went, regretfully.

_I _will _come back for you, _he swore silently. He would not leave Ben to Scorpia, not when it was his fault that he was in this situation to begin with.

"There they are!" A voice yelled. Yassen fired, and Alex jumped at the sound – Yassen had drawn the gun before he could have even blinked. He heard a cry of pain, and then he was pulled onwards.

"Can you shoot?" Yassen asked, his voice a whisper in Alex's ear so as to not bring any more guards down on them.

Alex nodded and took the proffered gun, trying not to think about what he had to do. He just had to get out of here, and he could examine his conscience later.

An alarm sounded somewhere above them, filling the hallways with an obnoxious siren. It sounded so much like an ordinary school bell that Alex wanted to laugh. The shock of hearing such a normal and annoying sound in a situation like this was surreal.

He managed to contain his mirth – hysterics was more like it, Alex realized – and followed Yassen to another stairwell at the end of the hall. He heard the door at the other end of the hall slam open as they vanished into these stairs. As they started up, an explosion rocked the building.

Yassen, who had been expecting it, held on to the railing and managed to remain upright and mobile.

Alex, who had not, stumbled and fell down a few stairs. Yassen pulled him back to his feet, and they were running again. They ran into another handful of guards on the next floor, and between Yassen and Alex, they managed to dispatch all of them.

The sound of another unit moving quickly down the stairs filled the narrow space.

"Keep moving," Yassen ordered, pushing him through the door of another floor, handing his a magazine clip. Alex switched out his near – empty one for the new one, and went through the door, gun out and ready for action.

The alarm was still ringing, making Alex cringe. He had always hated the sound at school, and it grated on his nerves now. He didn't run into any guards right away. He seemed to have burst out into a warehouse of some kind.

Alex moved quickly, his eyes scanning the room filled with stack upon stack of giant wooden crates. It almost looked like the warehouse at the end of _Raiders of the Lost Arc, _Alex thought, amused.

"Stop!"

_Has that line _ever _worked? _Alex wondered, annoyed. He spun around, firing. The guard went down like a lightweight and Alex was running again.

He had to find the exit.

He ran around a corner and found himself staring into the eyes of another unit of guards. Alex turned to run in the opposite direction, but another line of them was waiting for him.

_Well, fuck, _Alex thought viciously.

"Put down your weapon," one of the men ordered. They were all armed with what looked suspiciously like machine guns, and Alex didn't really want to end up on the receiving end of that kind of firepower.

"Considering you're just planning on killing me once I do, I don't think that that's really much incentive more me to put down my gun, is it?" Alex was trying to buy himself some time. He scanned the area around them. There was no way past either line of guards. So moving down the corridor made by the stacked crates was impossible.

On the other hand, the world had more than two dimensions, Alex thought, looking at the crates themselves. If he managed to get and over that one crate a few feet above him, he would have some cover, and he could drop into the next row and make a run for it.

It was worth a shot.

One of the guards had been talking but Alex tuned him out, paying more attention to the business of getting away. Now he smiled coldly at the guards.

"Later gaters," he said, firing as he climbed up the mountain of crates to his right, one handed. He only _just _made it behind the crate he had seen, ducking as a flurry of hunfire slammed into the wood.

He moved away, jumping up and over the crate on top of the stack not a second too soon either, because it seemed that that crate had held incendiaries. Alex was thrown to the floor by a massive explosion, ignited by the gunfire.

A pair of hands pulled him to his feet, and before Alex could fight back, he saw that it was Yassen that was trying to help him right himself.

"Just in time," he said. Yassen smiled tightly, and they took off running moments later. There were yells from the row next to them, but they didn't meet anyone else as Yassen headed them towards the exit. They were out and running before Alex could even register that it was a bright and sunny day, and there was _wind _blowing at his face.

He stopped dead in his tracks, but he was pulled forward again by Yassen's momentum.

"Move!" Yassen called.

Another explosion, behind them, made Alex look back.

The whole building was on fire. He wondered what had happened to everyone underground.

And then he looked around at his surroundings for the first time.

It was sandy and hot outside, desert stretching out around them. If it hadn't been for the big warehouse, Alex would have thought that they were in the middle of a massive desert.

Which, it seemed, they were.

"Where are we?" he asked.

"We are in Tunisia," Yassen answered, moving towards one of the jeeps parked about ten yards from the burning building. He was no longer rushing, but his movements were quick and precise.

"We should get moving now, before they send reinforcements to find out what happened," Yassen continued.

"Aren't you going to be in trouble for helping me?" Alex asked. _And murdering a whole bunch of guards in the process._

"Worried about my safety Alex? I'm touched," Yassen said sarcastically, reaching through the open window of one of the jeeps to open the car.

Alex rolled his eyes.

"What is this place?" he asked instead as Yassen lowered himself to the floor of the car on the drivers side to pry away the plastic façade below the wheel. Alex realized he was going to try and hotwire the car.

"It used to serve as a base for the PLO when they were effectively banished to Tunisia," Yassen said. "Since then, Scorpia has been using it as a holding cell for their more… troublesome… captives."

"I hate to bring up the fact that you brought me here to begin with," Alex said as the engine roared to life, "but… um… you did. So can you please explain what the hell is going on?"

"I've had a tail on me since I recovered from the injuries I sustained on Air Force One," Yassen said, motioning for Alex to get in. "I'm afraid Scorpia no longer fully trusts me. Delivering you to them changed that, and allowed me to recover some information for my new employers that has been of great use."

"You mean you no longer work for Scorpia?"

Alex's head hurt.

"No Alex, I do not."

………………………………………………………………………

Three days later, Alex was on a plane back to England. Yassen had procured a false identity and passport for him. He was a British national, Gary Davidson, who had come to Tunisia for a language emersion program, and was finally coming home.

Alex didn't know if it would convince British customs, but he was willing to give it a shot. He was exhausted.

Yassen had parted company with him in the Tunisian airport, giving him a vague explanation.

Alex didn't know what to think of the man. Yassen had killed his uncle, worked with his father, and saved his life numerous times.

He was clearly one of the bad guys, so why was he trying to keep Alex alive?

The question was like a fly buzzing in Alex's ear. He couldn't stop concentrating on it.

Nor could he stop meditating on what Yassen had said about not working for Scorpia any more. What was going on?

Alex's musings were interrupted rudely by a shout from the front of the plane. Alex's head snapped up instantly.

"Everyone get down!"

The voice was yelling in English, and the command was then repeated in Arabic and Swahili.

Screams erupted at the first sight of the man whose face was hidden by a kafia and was holding a pistol in his right hand.

A voice spoke over the intercom.

"This is a hijacking," the voice said. It was male, and definitely Arabic. "If any of you attempt to pull any heroics, you will be dead. If you do not follow our orders, you will be dead. Understand this. I do not care about any of your lives."

More screams erupted, which were immediately silenced when one of the men wearing kafias slammed the butt of his gun into the closest screaming persons head. Unfortunately, Alex was sitting right next to the woman.

Her eyes rolled back in her head when the gun came in contact with her head, and Alex saw her crumple back, feeling a sense of horror penetrate his heart.

_What are the odds? _He demanded mentally as he locked eyes with the terrorist. _What are the fucking odds that one of the first major plane hijackings since 9/11 happens when I'm on the plane? What divine authority did I piss off this badly?_

The terrorist looked away, and Alex felt himself let out a breath he hadn't even realized he was holding.

"What do you want?" Someone yelled from the back of the plane.

"It is very simple," the man up front called. The whole plane quieted when he spoke.

"The British government will capitulate to our demands, or July sixth will be a day that will live in infamy in Britain. You all will die, as will a large number of people besides."

Alex was rooted to his seat as one of the terrorists passed by again.

_Fuck._

………………………………………………………………………

**Ladies and gentlemen, that's a wrap! It has been a pleasure writing for you all, and we'll see you again in Operation: Bury Your Dead!**

**Well, what did you think? I don't want to be a review whore… but until I get at least five, I'm going to work on my other fics for a little while. =)**

**(Psst: That means that you should hit that tiny little review button.)**

**~InK**


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